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Bible Quotation For Today/You cross sea and land to make a single convert, and you make the new convert twice as much a child of hell as yourselves
Matthew 23/13-15: "‘But woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you lock people out of the kingdom of heaven. For you do not go in yourselves, and when others are going in, you stop them. Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you cross sea and land to make a single convert, and you make the new convert twice as much a child of hell as yourselves."

Bible Quotation For Today/Paul: What are you doing, weeping and breaking my heart? For I am ready not only to be bound but even to die in Jerusalem for the name of the Lord Jesus.
Acts of the Apostles 21/01-14: "When we had parted from them and set sail, we came by a straight course to Cos, and the next day to Rhodes, and from there to Patara. When we found a ship bound for Phoenicia, we went on board and set sail. We came in sight of Cyprus; and leaving it on our left, we sailed to Syria and landed at Tyre, because the ship was to unload its cargo there. We looked up the disciples and stayed there for seven days. Through the Spirit they told Paul not to go on to Jerusalem. When our days there were ended, we left and proceeded on our journey; and all of them, with wives and children, escorted us outside the city. There we knelt down on the beach and prayed and said farewell to one another. Then we went on board the ship, and they returned home.
When we had finished the voyage from Tyre, we arrived at Ptolemais; and we greeted the believers and stayed with them for one day. The next day we left and came to Caesarea; and we went into the house of Philip the evangelist, one of the seven, and stayed with him.
He had four unmarried daughters who had the gift of prophecy. While we were staying there for several days, a prophet named Agabus came down from Judea. He came to us and took Paul’s belt, bound his own feet and hands with it, and said, ‘Thus says the Holy Spirit, "This is the way the Jews in Jerusalem will bind the man who owns this belt and will hand him over to the Gentiles." ’ When we heard this, we and the people there urged him not to go up to Jerusalem. Then Paul answered, ‘What are you doing, weeping and breaking my heart? For I am ready not only to be bound but even to die in Jerusalem for the name of the Lord Jesus.’ Since he would not be persuaded, we remained silent except to say, ‘The Lord’s will be done.’"

LCCC Latest analysis, editorials from miscellaneous sources published on July 26-27/15
Finally... In garbage the Lebanese are united/Mohamed Chebarro/Al Arabiya/26 July/15
Israel Confronts the Iran Nuclear Deal/Michael Herzog/Washington Institute/July 26/15
Assad: Iran deal is proof that we must not compromise/Roi Kais/Ynetnews /July 26/15
Islamist "Justice": Slow Painful Death for Christian Mother in Pakistan/Raymond Ibrahim/Gatestone Institute/July 26/15
Turkey Uses ISIS as Excuse to Attack Kurds/by Uzay Bulut/Gatestone Institute/July 26/15
Turkey’s double trouble: ISIS and the PKK/Brooklyn Middleton/Al Arabiya/26 July/15
What is the matter with America/Hisham Melhem/Al Arabiya/26 July/15
The Gulf’s disagreement with the U.S. is on details/Abdulrahman al-Rashed/Al Arabiya/26 July/15
What Tomi Lahren got right and Obama got wrong/Faisal J. Abbas/Al Arabya/26 July/15

LCCC Bulletin titles for the Lebanese Related News published on July 26-27/15
Saniora: Nasrallah Orchestrating FPM's Moves and Trying to Usurp PM's Right to Resig
Report: Salam is Serious on Resignation
Lebanese Army Arrests Two Wanted Individuals in al-Taybeh
Iqlim al-Kharroub Residents Block Beirut-South Highway to Prevent Waste Transfer to Their Region
Trash Collection Restarts in Beirut after Landfill Crisis
Derbas: Salam to Announce His Decision at Right Time
Alain Aoun: Garbage Crisis did not Linger in Cabinet, No Intention to Obstruct Tuesday Session
Man Shot in Baalbek over Real Estate Dispute

LCCC Bulletin Miscellaneous Reports And News published on July 26-27/15
At Least 6 Dead in Bomb Blast at Somali Capital Hotel
Clashes Rock Jerusalem's al-Aqsa Mosque
Egypt Nile Boat Crash Death Toll Rises to 36
Bahrain Detains Pair Accused of Smuggling Arms from Iran
Clinton to Testify Publicly in October on Benghazi Attack
Obama Ends Kenya Visit with Tough Message on Rights, Corruption
Iran FM Zarif urges unity with Arabs against militancy
Assad admits shortfall in Syrian army capacity
Israeli police storm Jerusalem’s al-Aqsa mosque
Bomb kills two Turkish soldiers in Kurdish area
Egypt extends state of emergency in North Sinai
Iraq forces retake university on edge of Ramadi

Saniora: Nasrallah Orchestrating FPM's Moves and Trying to Usurp PM's Right to Resign
Naharnet/26 July/15/Head of al-Mustaqbal parliamentary bloc ex-PM Fouad Saniora snapped back Sunday at Hizbullah chief Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah, condemning his remarks on the government and the domestic affairs and accusing him of orchestrating the latest moves of the Free Patriotic Movement. “In the remarks he addressed to al-Mustaqbal movement, he openly declared that he supports the FPM in its coup against the Constitution and the government,” Saniora said in a statement, referring to the televised speech that Nasrallah delivered on Saturday. “Sayyed Nasrallah admitted, without equivocation, that Hizbullah is orchestrating the FPM's moves and standing behind its attempts to undermine stability in Lebanon through paralyzing state institutions,” Saniora added. On Saturday, Nasrallah called on Mustaqbal to engage in dialogue with the FPM to resolve the country's crisis, warning that a possible resignation by Prime Minister Tammam Salam would only plunge the country into further political vacuum. The FPM has been seeking a change in the government's decision-making mechanism, after it accused Salam of infringing on the authorities of the Christian president. “Yesterday, Sayyed Nasrallah added new tasks to his tasks as Hizbullah's secretary-general: giving orders to al-Mustaqbal movement to go to a dialogue with the FPM,” Saniora added. “It was laughable yet lamentable that he specified the topics and results of this dialogue in advance, thinking that al-Mustaqbal movement would submit to his desire without any objections,” the ex-PM went on to say.
He also accused Nasrallah of “appointing himself as a political guide who gives orders and instructions” through “his attempt to usurp the premier's right to resign.”"On this occasion, it is necessary to laud the patriotic and responsible role that is being practiced by PM Tammam Salam, who enjoys the confidence of the majority of Lebanese and who has enough wisdom and patience to rise above any dictates,” Saniora added. “Sayyed Nasrallah's remarks clearly demonstrate that he is using (FPM chief) General (Michel) Aoun and the FPM to achieve his goals, while in return General Aoun is relying on Sayyed Nasrallah and Hizbullah's statements and trying to accuse a certain sect of infringing on the rights of another sect,” he said. Saniora underlined that the solution to the political crisis lies in “the immediate election of a president so that the constitutional institutions can regain their role.”“Hizbullah is asked to return to the principle of the state so that we can avoid further divides, sedition and gambling with the country's future,” he added.

Report: Salam is Serious on Resignation
Naharnet/26 July/15/Prime Minister Tammam Salam is "not kidding" when it comes to his resignation on the backdrop of the governmental crisis, and he will not keep guard for attempts to obstruct cabinet, governmental sources told al-Mustaqbal daily on Sunday.
“Hizbullah and the Free Patriotic Movement have not offered any initiative what so ever on Salam to find a solution for the governmental crisis,” they said. “Since the debate triggered by Foreign Minister Jebran Bassil with Salam during the cabinet session that was held before Eid al-Fitr, and the visit of (Hizbullah Minister) Mohammed Fneish to the Grand Serail praising the PM's wisdom, no serious steps have been recorded,” added the sources on condition of anonymity. However they pointed to the escalatory measures announced by Hizbullah's parliamentary bloc in a statement “where the party announced a new path to be taken to confront the government.”Salam has threatened lately that he would submit his resignation to object the “paralysis” caused by the Free Patriotic Movement. The cabinet crisis grew earlier this month when Free Patriotic Movement Minister Jebran Bassil bickered with Salam during a session after accusing him of infringing on the Christian president's powers in the absence of a head of state. The cabinet has been paralyzed since early June when Salam suspended the sessions over a dispute on the appointment of high-ranking security and military officials. Free Patriotic Movement ministers have warned they would boycott any session whose agenda is not topped by the appointments. The parliament has also been paralyzed over a dispute between the rival MPs on the presidential elections. Their rivalry has left Baabda Palace vacant since the expiry of President Michel Suleiman's term in May last year.

Lebanese Army Arrests Two Wanted Individuals in al-Taybeh
Naharnet/26 July/15/Army Intelligence units arrested two wanted individuals in the town of al-Taybeh on the highway of Baalbek on charges of shooting at their patrol, the state-run National News Agency said on Sunday. The two suspects shot at the army patrol who arrested one of them and shot the other in the foot.He was transported to the hospital for treatment. Several illegal items were also found in their vehicle.

Iqlim al-Kharroub Residents Block Beirut-South Highway to Prevent Waste Transfer to Their Region
Naharnet/26 July/15/Residents of the Chouf area of Iqlim al-Kharroub southeast of Beirut blocked the vital Beirut-South highway early Sunday in protest at the environment ministry's decision to transfer the garbage that has been accumulating over the last week to their province, the state-run National News Agency reported. The residents gathered on the coastal highway in the town of Jiyeh at the junction of Barja and blocked the road in both directions. Some youths also blocked the road leading to the Siblin Cement Factory fearing that dump trucks might take the garbage to that destination, NNA added. The Lebanese Broadcasting Corporation later said that the residents erected tents in the middle of the Jiyeh highway. The protesters also prevented 4 dump trucks from passing. NNA later said that they emptied stone-loaded trucks in the middle of the highway. They stressed that they will not open the road until the environment ministry backs down from its decision. However, the adjacent seaside road was "partially" reopened in both directions in the afternoon, according to the Traffic Management Center. TMC said the area was witnessing traffic congestion. Beirut and the Mount Lebanon area were plunged into a waste disposal crisis following last week's closure of the Naameh landfill without finding an alternative.
Garbage has been piling on the streets of the capital and Mount Lebanon after dumpsters overflowed with tons of trash. Some people have resorted to burning the waste to tackle the problem amid the government's ongoing failure to find a solution to the crisis, although health experts have warned of the hazards resulting from such a move.

Trash Collection Restarts in Beirut after Landfill Crisis
Agence France Presse/Naharnet/26 July/15/Trash collection resumed in the capital Beirut after an almost week-long crisis that has seen streets overflowing with waste and the air filled with the smell of rotting garbage. The collection restarted after a temporary deal was found to begin taking trash to several landfills in undisclosed locations. "Coordination is now underway for trash to be taken from treatment plants to these places and for the restarting of street sweeping and collection of trash from the streets," the official National News Agency quoted Environment Minister Mohammed al-Mashnouq as saying late Saturday. He said the resumption came "after an understanding was reached on the areas where the trash will be treated," without specifying where those areas were. Beirut and the surrounding region have been in the grip of a trash crisis for the last six days after residents living near the country's largest landfill shut it down. The government pledged last year that Naameh landfill would be closed on July 17 and an alternative site be found. But the date came and went with no solution found and residents began blocking the route to the site in the mountains outside Beirut. Initially, the city's trash collector, the Sukleen firm, stored waste at its facilities, but by July 20 they were at capacity and garbage began piling up in the streets. Experts have urged the government to devise a comprehensive waste management solution that would include more recycling and composting to reduce the amount of trash going into landfills. But so far there was no evidence of such a plan, and there was already opposition to the temporary solution.

Derbas: Salam to Announce His Decision at Right Time
Naharnet/26 July/15/Social Affairs Minister Rashid Derbas, who is close to Prime Minister Tammam Salam, announced Sunday that the embattled premier will “announce his decision at the right time,” amid reports that the PM is on the brink of resignation over the growing cabinet crisis.“The government is not only its head, as there are ministers and components, and it is unfair to blame the premier for the behavior of the components,” said Derbas after meeting Salam in Msaitbeh. “What we're seeing on the streets is an inevitable results of the cabinet paralysis,” the minister added, referring to the accumulation of garbage on the streets and protests over the government's failure to address the waste management crisis. “The premier will not be forced to make any decision. He has a freewill and the ability to decide and he will announce his decision at the right time,” Derbas said. He noted, however, that Salam “will not renounce his responsibilities, as he knows, more than anyone else, that the fate of the country is hinging on his decision.”“I believe that this man will not abandon his responsibilities, seeing as his family has a long history of shouldering (national) responsibility,” Derbas pointed out. Asked about what Salam intends to do in the coming days, the minister said: “All options are open before the premier. No one can usurp any of his powers.
“Resignation is part of his jurisdiction, as well as calling on the cabinet to convene or giving it a vacation, in addition to the agenda and the order of its articles,” Derbas added.

Alain Aoun: Garbage Crisis did not Linger in Cabinet, No Intention to Obstruct Tuesday Session
Naharnet/26 July/15/ Change and Reform bloc MP Alain Hakim stressed on Sunday that the temporary solution reached in the cabinet on the garbage crisis “proves that the problem did no lie there in the first place,” assuring that the bloc has no intention to obstruct the government’s work during Tuesday's session. “The temporary solution reached in the cabinet on the waste management crisis proves that the problem did not lie primarily there,” said Aoun. “As a political team, we have done our duties on several situations starting with rejecting the extension of the contract with Sukleen down to the tender conditions,” he said. He emphasized that “Lebanon cannot depend on the traditional technique of land-filling because it has proven inefficiency and the country's inability to absorb,” stressing that “the Change and Reform bloc has always called for a solution to the looming crisis.” Beirut and the Mount Lebanon area were plunged in a waste disposal crisis following last week's closure of the Naameh landfill without finding an alternative. The closure of the landfill coincided with the end of the contract with the Sukleen company responsible for collecting garbage in Mount Lebanon and Beirut. On the cabinet session slated for Tuesday, the Free Patriotic Movement MP said: “Every minister is part of the President of the Republic because the jurisdictions of the president have moved now to the government. “We do not advocate obstruction and we have never called for Salam's resignation. We only seek to activate the government according to the norms,” he added.
“We are holding consultations with all parties, and we do not intend to go Tuesday's cabinet session with intentions to obstruct.”

Man Shot in Baalbek over Real Estate Dispute
A man was shot and wounded Sunday in the Bekaa city of Baalbek over a real estate dispute, state-run National News Agency reported. “H. M. Hlaihel fired a pistol at Nader Ahmed Hlaihel, 41, in the Baalbek district of al-Qalaa over a dispute on the ownership of a real estate property,” NNA said. The victim received gunshot wounds to the foot and neck, the agency added. The shooter fled to an unknown destination as the injured man was rushed to the Dar al-Amal Hospital for treatment, the agency added. Later on Sunday, the gunman turned himself in to the Baalbek police station, NNA reported.

At Least 6 Dead in Bomb Blast at Somali Capital Hotel
Agence France Presse/Naharnet/26 July/15/At least six people were killed Sunday when a suspected car bomb exploded at a heavily guarded hotel in the Somali capital Mogadishu housing diplomatic missions and frequented by government officials and international workers."We have seen around six people killed, most of them hotel security guards," said government security officer Mohamed Jama, adding that casualty numbers might rise.A huge blast shook the area on Sunday afternoon sending a thick plume of smoke high into the air. The African Union force, AMISOM, which is fighting the Shebab insurgents, confirmed the explosion at the Jazeera Palace Hotel. There was a heavy explosion at the Jazeera Palace hotel, there are casualties," said police officer Abdirahman Ahmed. Local resident Abdihakim Ainte, a political analyst, was nearby when the bomb exploded and described a "huge blast" that smashed his window. He said the hotel, which has been attacked several times in the past by Islamist gunmen, had been "torn apart" by the blast. Photographs shared on social media showed one side of the multi-story hotel shredded by the explosion. Mohamed Moalim was inside the hotel when the bomb exploded. "It was a truck loaded with explosives -- and the biggest ever (explosion) around this area," he said. The diplomatic missions of both China and Qatar are based in the hotel. There was no immediate claim of responsibility, but the al-Qaida-affiliated Shebab have attacked the hotel before as part of their regular bombing campaign. The Shebab are fighting to overthrow Somalia's Western-backed government which is propped up and protected by the 22,000-strong AMISOM.

Clashes Rock Jerusalem's al-Aqsa Mosque
Agence France Presse/Naharnet/26 July/15/Israeli police entered Jerusalem's al-Aqsa mosque, one of Islam's holiest sites, as clashes erupted on Sunday over Jews' access to the compound on an annual day of Jewish mourning. Palestinians threw stones and fireworks while Israeli police fired stun grenades after security forces entered the al-Aqsa compound before briefly going inside the mosque itself. Police said they went a few meters (yards) into the mosque to shut the doors in a bid to restore calm and lock in rioters who were inside. About 300 security personnel had entered the compound when the clashes began with a couple of hundred Palestinians, an AFP photographer reported. The Palestinian foreign ministry condemned Israeli authorities for allowing what they described as "provocative" visits by hardline Jews. It was the first time Israeli security forces had entered the mosque since November, when clashes with worshipers also erupted. There were multiple casualties and arrests surrounding the clashes, which came as Jews sought to access the mosque compound on Tisha B'av, a day commemorating the destruction in ancient times of the first and second temples. Palestinians were angered by what they considered intrusions by Jews. Visits are allowed, but Jewish prayer at the site is prohibited. Tensions were already high after a Jewish woman publicly made insulting comments about the Prophet Mohammed last week. The hilltop compound in Jerusalem's Old City, one of the biggest flashpoints in the Middle East, is the most sacred site in Judaism and Islam's third holiest, after Mecca and Medina. Jews refer to the site as the Temple Mount. "Masked rioters fled into the mosque and started to throw stones and blocks at police from inside al-Aqsa mosque," police said in a statement. "They threw fireworks directly at police ... In light of the severe confrontation and the escalating actions of the rioters and with the aim of preventing further injury to police...forces entered a number of meters (yards) inside and closed the doors to the mosque with the rioters inside, restoring order."
Ready to die
The police said that after their brief foray into the mosque, they withdrew and the area was quiet. Access to the site was later restricted. Protests broke out in the lanes and alleyways of the Old City around the mosque, with demonstrators confronting police and chanting "Allahu Akbar" and police firing stun grenades. Some vowed to protect al-Aqsa, with one man saying the holy site "is in our blood." "We are ready to die," Khaled Tuffaha, a 46-year-old Palestinian shop owner. "Everybody is ready to die." One 22-year-old Jewish religious student, carrying a Torah holy book who said he was briefly in the compound during the clashes, argued that Jews and Muslims should share access. "One day for Jews, one day for Muslims," said the student, Josef Maklov. Police said that a young Jewish man attempted to enter while wearing phylacteries -- small leather boxes containing sacred texts worn by Orthodox men at prayer. When told to remove them, the man resisted and grabbed hold of railings, biting a policeman who tried to remove him before he was arrested. At least three stone-throwers were arrested and four police were lightly wounded, authorities said. One Palestinian man was seen bleeding from the head and protesters spoke of further injuries, but details were not immediately clear. Police reinforcements had deployed in the Old City overnight for fear of unrest as thousands of observant Jews flocked to the Western Wall for the annual prayer ceremony. After Israeli police entered the mosque in November, Jordan -- one of the very few Arab states with diplomatic relations with Israel -- recalled its ambassador. Israel seized east Jerusalem in the Six Day War of 1967 and later annexed it in a move never recognized by the international community. Israel considers all of Jerusalem as its indivisible capital, but the Palestinians claim the eastern sector as capital of their promised state. A handful of Jewish ultranationalist fringe groups hope to one day see a third temple built at the Temple Mount, further stoking tensions over the site.

Egypt Nile Boat Crash Death Toll Rises to 36
Agence France Presse/Naharnet/26 July/15/Rescuers recovered seven more bodies from the Nile after a party boat collided with a cargo ship earlier this week, raising the death toll to 36, Egyptian officials said Sunday. The accident, the deadliest such incident on the Nile in years, occurred late Wednesday when the victims were celebrating an engagement on a vessel that was struck by a cargo ship. The captain of the cargo boat and his assistants were arrested following the accident in the Warraq district north of Cairo. They have been charged with manslaughter. "We have recovered 36 bodies and the majority of the victims are children and women," General Magdi Al-Shalaqami from the interior ministry told Agence France Presse, raising the death toll from an earlier figure of 29. Rescuers were still searching for more bodies, he said, with search operations expanded to other provinces. Health ministry spokesman Hossam Abdel Ghaffar said among those dead were 20 children, some aged as young as four. In a meeting on Sunday the cabinet took several decisions "in order to achieve discipline on the Nile," a government statement said. The cabinet banned all night-time movement of cargo ships on the Nile in and around Cairo until September, the statement said. It banned use of loud speakers on vessels hired for private ceremonies and on ferries transporting people. The cabinet also decided not to build new berths along the river. The Nile, which runs along the length of Egypt, is dotted with cargo ships, party boats and fishing vessels. In 2011, at least 22 people drowned in southern Egypt's Beni Suef province when a bus they were in fell into the Nile from a ferry which crashed into the river bank.

Bahrain Detains Pair Accused of Smuggling Arms from Iran
Agence France Presse/Naharnet/26 July/15/Bahrain said it detained two men accused of trying to smuggle weapons from Iran, with which the small Gulf kingdom has strained relations.Machine guns, ammunition and C4 explosives were found after the boat was seized off Bahrain last week, the interior ministry said in a statement late Saturday. The coastguard retrieved the weapons from the seabed after two men on board dropped them when a Bahraini helicopter approached, the ministry said. It said its investigation and questioning of the pair revealed that one of them was trained in Iran in August 2013 and "underwent intensive training in making and using explosives". According to the statement, he was given money by the Iranian Revolutionary Guard to buy the boat and the men received the weapons off the coast of Iran. There was no immediate comment from the Iranian authorities. The announcement came hours after Sunni-ruled Bahrain, which has a Shiite majority, said it was recalling its envoy from Tehran in protest at "hostile" comments by Iranian leaders. Parliament's foreign affairs committee demanded an extraordinary Arab summit to discuss "Iranian interference". On July 19, Bahrain summoned Iran's acting charge d'affaires to protest against the Islamic republic's supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei voicing support for "oppressed people" across the Middle East, including in Bahrain. Manama accuses Shiite Iran of backing opposition demands in Bahrain for a constitutional monarchy and an elected prime minister. Bahrain, which lies just across the Gulf from Iran and is home to the U.S. Fifth Fleet, has seen frequent clashes between protesters and security forces in Shiite villages since an Arab Spring-inspired uprising was crushed four years ago.

Clinton to Testify Publicly in October on Benghazi Attack
Agence France Presse/Naharnet/26 July/15/Hillary Clinton will testify publicly on October 22 before a congressional panel probing the deadly 2012 attack on the U.S. consulate in Benghazi, Libya, her presidential campaign said Saturday. The attack left ambassador Chris Stevens dead, along with three other Americans, and has haunted Clinton as a policy-maker and presidential candidate ever since. Clinton, who was secretary of state at the time, has been negotiating the terms of her testimony with the House of Representatives panel that is investigating the September 11, 2012 attack.Campaign spokesman Nick Merrill confirmed Clinton will testify in public session rather than behind closed doors. Republicans have criticized the handling of the attack. President Barack Obama's administration initially said the attack was the spontaneous act of a mob enraged by a video circulating on the Internet that insulted Islam. But days later the administration changed its version of events and said the attack was an act terrorism. Obama was up for re-election in less than two months' time. And critics said the initial account -- mob violence rather than a premeditated terror attack -- sought to mislead the public and avoid angering American voters worried about terrorism. The State Department has started releasing emails from Clinton's time as secretary of state, and some of them deal with the Benghazi attack. That correspondence is politically sensitive for Clinton too because she has admitted using a private server and email address during her time as the top American diplomat from 2009 to early 2013. The Justice Department said Friday it has been asked by internal inspectors to consider opening a formal probe of Clinton over that, on grounds she may have mishandled classified information.

Obama Ends Kenya Visit with Tough Message on Rights, Corruption
Agence France Presse/Naharnet/26 July/15/U.S. President Barack Obama on Sunday ended a landmark visit to Kenya, urging the east African nation and birthplace of his father to renounce corruption, tribalism and inequality. Speaking to a raucous crowd in an indoor arena in the capital Nairobi, Obama said Kenya needed to ditch "bad traditions" including endemic bribe-taking, domestic violence, female genital mutilation and communal violence. "Kenya is at a crossroads, a moment filled with enormous peril but also enormous promise," he said in a rousing live address to the nation. Seeking to leverage his status as a "son of the soil" and his huge local popularity, Obama said his ancestral homeland faced "tough choices" ahead, urging Kenyans to end the "bad tradition" of failing to empower women, while warning that "a politics based only on tribe and ethnicity is a politics doomed to tear a country apart." "Treating women as second-class citizens... those are bad traditions, they need to change, they are holding you back," he said. "Corruption is not unique to Kenya, but the fact is too often corruption is tolerated because that's how things have always been done," he said. "Just because something is a part of your past doesn't make it right."
Throughout his two-day trip, Obama has tried to bridge two constituencies: Americans reexamining their stereotypes of Africa, and Africans hoping for a better future. But the friendly, aspirational message belies a hard-nosed security need. A young but impoverished population could be fertile ground for instability and the growth of groups like Somalia's al-Qaida-affiliated Shebab -- who have also been at the top of the list of security concerns surrounding Obama's stay. There were no reported security incidents during the visit, although as the presidential jet Air Force One took off from Kenya and headed to Ethiopia, a major bomb blast -- most likely carried out by the Shebab -- hit a hotel in Somalia's capital Mogadishu. The target was a heavily guarded building housing diplomatic missions and frequented by government officials and international workers. The visit has seen the United States increase its trade ties and security assistance to Kenya, with Obama also urging the country to respect its Muslim minority. The Kasarani stadium complex where Obama delivered the speech was used to hold hundreds of ethnic Somalis during controversial mass arrests following the 2013 Somali-led Shebab assault on the Westgate shopping mall in central Nairobi that killed 67.
Homecoming
Obama then met members of Kenya's vibrant civil society -- bearing the brunt of what they say are increased restrictions as Kenya fights a "war on terror" -- as well as opposition politicians. Obama's visit to Kenya had been delayed while President Uhuru Kenyatta faced charges of crimes against humanity for his role in post-election violence seven years ago. The International Criminal Court has since dropped the case, citing a lack of evidence and accusing Kenya of bribing or intimidating witnesses, although the trial of deputy president William Ruto continues. On Saturday, Obama stressed the importance of protecting basic rights, comparing homophobia in Africa to racial discrimination he had encountered in the United States. "As an African-American in the United States I am painfully aware of what happens when people are treated differently under the law. I am unequivocal on this," Obama said, openly disagreeing with Kenyatta. Homophobia is on the rise in Africa and espousing evangelical Christian values is a major vote-winner in many countries.
Kenyatta replied by repeating the view that gay rights were unacceptable to Kenyans and therefore "a non-issue." Compounding the "homecoming" atmosphere of the visit, Obama recalled details of pre-presidential trips to Kenya replete with the stuff of everyday life: broken down cars, traditional foods, lost luggage and reconnecting with his family. The president, however, joked that he wasn't in the country "to look for my birth certificate." Barack Obama Sr was a pipe-smoking economist who walked out when Obama was just two and died in a car crash in Nairobi in 1982, aged 46. Obama promised to be back when his presidency ends, telling leading Kenyan broadcaster Capital FM that climbing Mount Kilimanjaro, a safari in the Masai Mara and a beach holiday in Lamu were all on his bucket list.
"Climbing Kilimanjaro seems like something that should be on my list of things to do once I get out of here. The Secret Service generally doesn't like me climbing mountains, but as a private citizen hopefully I can get away with something like that," he said.

Iran FM Zarif urges unity with Arabs against militancy
By AFP, AP | Kuwait City/Sunday, 26 July 2015
Iran's foreign minister urged Gulf Arab countries to join forces with Tehran to fight against extremism and militancy in the Middle East. "Any threat to one country is a threat to all... No country can solve regional problems without the help of others," Mohammad Javad Zarif said at a news conference in Kuwait. Zarif arrived in Kuwait on Sunday to begin a three-nation regional tour aimed at deepening ties with Arab neighbors following the conclusion of the Islamic Republic’s historic nuclear deal with world powers. Saudi Arabia and other Western-allied Arab states lining the Persian Gulf harbor deep suspicions about Iran’s intentions in the region, though they have expressed hope that the nuclear deal will enhance regional security by reducing the chances Iran will acquire an atomic bomb. Zarif received a red-carpet airport greeting from his Kuwaiti counterpart, Sheikh Sabah Khaled Al Hamad Al Sabah. He is expected to hold talks later with the ruling emir, Sheikh Sabah Al Ahmed Al Sabah, who paid his first visit as head of state to Iran last year.
Iran agreed earlier this month to limits on its nuclear program in exchange for broad sanctions relief. The curbs are aimed at preventing Iran from obtaining an atomic bomb, something it denies it is seeking. After Kuwait, Zarif is scheduled to visit Qatar and Iraq. Iranian state-linked media say he will brief officials in all three countries on the nuclear accord and discuss ways to improve cooperation and fight terrorism. Iran shares control of a vast underwater natural gas field with Qatar, a wealthy nation rapidly being transformed by its hydrocarbon riches. In Iraq, Tehran has close ties with senior government leaders and Shiite militia groups, and it is playing an active role in fighting Islamic State militants who have seized a third of the country. Growing discord with another Gulf Arab state, the island nation of Bahrain, threatens to overshadow Zarif’s outreach effort. Bahrain on Saturday announced it was recalling its ambassador to Iran for consultations following what it called “continued hostile statements made by Iranian officials towards Bahrain,” according to the official Bahrain News Agency. Authorities also announced they have broken up an attempt to smuggle weapons, ammunition and explosives into the kingdom. Among those arrested were two 30-year-old Bahraini suspects, Mahdi Subah Abdulmohsen Mohammed and Abbas Abdulhussain Abdullah Mohammed. Officials say the first suspect received military training in Iran in August 2013, and that the men admitted to receiving the shipment from “Iranian handlers outside Bahrain’s territorial waters.” Bahraini authorities have announced similar confiscations of contraband weapons and explosives in the past. A Shiite-led opposition movement in Bahrain continues to press for reform in the country, which hosts the U.S. Navy’s 5th Fleet. Iran has voiced support for those demanding change in Bahrain but denies direct interference in the country. Bahrain last week summoned Iran’s acting charge d’affaires, Mortadha Sanubari, to protest comments made by top Iranian leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. In a televised speech earlier this month, Khamenei said Iran would continue to support its regional friends despite its recent nuclear deal with world powers, including “the oppressed Palestinian nation, Yemen, Syria, Iraq (and) Bahrain.” Iranian Deputy Foreign Minister for Consular Affairs Hassan Ghashghavi downplayed the ambassador’s recall. He said it was only for consultations and that there would be no cut in diplomatic ties, according to the official IRNA news agency.

Assad admits shortfall in Syrian army capacity
By Staff writer | Al Arabiya News/Syrian President Bashar Al Assad described Sunday talks towards a political solution to the ongoing war in Syria as “hollow” and “meaningless.”During a televised speech before local dignitaries in the Syrian capital, Damascus, the Syrian president also said that the army faced a shortfall in manpower and may have to give up positions in order to hold on to others of greater importance in its war with insurgents. “The army is capable ... Everything is available, but there is a shortfall in human capacity," Assad said. He said groups fighting to topple him had received increased backing from their state sponsors. "Every inch of Syria is precious," Assad added. Assad's speech comes after his government announced a general amnesty for army deserters and draft dodgers Saturday. There are thousands of army deserters in and outside Syria, many of whom have gone on to fight with rebels seeking to topple Assad. The overstretched Syrian army suffers manpower shortages as young men flee the country to avoid compulsory military conscription.
Assad has issued similar amnesties for criminals, but has not released any of the thousands of political prisoners believed to be in Syria's prisons. Assad said that his government did not want war "but when it was imposed on us, the Syrian Arab army repelled the terrorists everywhere." Assad refers to any rebel group fighting against his rule as terrorists. The U.S. has begun training some moderate rebels who oppose Assad, but the civil war has seen Islamic extremist groups become the most effective on the ground. Those include the extremist ISIS group, which holds about a third of Syria and neighboring Iraq in its self-declared "caliphate."

Israeli police storm Jerusalem’s al-Aqsa mosque
By Reuters | Jerusalem/Sunday, 26 July 2015
Masked rock-throwing Palestinians and Israeli police using stun grenades clashed on Sunday at al-Aqsa mosque plaza, on the annual Jewish day of mourning for Jerusalem's two destroyed Biblical temples. No serious injuries were reported at the site, which lies in the Israeli-occupied walled Old City and is revered by Muslims as the Noble Sanctuary and by Jews as the Temple Mount where two temples once stood. A police spokeswoman said Palestinians had prepared makeshift barricades and used rocks, metal bars and flares to attack police who came to dismantle them. Violence at the site has flared in the past year as Palestinians have been riled by visits by non-Muslims, including ultranationalist Jews, to the compound. Police used stun grenades to push protesters back into the mosque and stepped inside its entrance way to close its main doors, which the spokeswoman said had been jammed open by rock-throwers. Israeli police, following long-standing procedures, do not venture further into the mosque, Islam's third holiest shrine, and violence usually subsides quickly, as it did on Sunday, after Palestinian demonstrators take refuge inside. Jewish ultranationalists have been pushing the Israeli government to allow Jewish prayer on the compound outside al-Aqsa, which stands above the Western Wall. Such worship, certain to stir Muslim anger, has been banned on the plaza by Israel since it captured East Jerusalem, and its Old City, in the 1967 Middle East war. After Sunday's violence ended, a right-wing Israeli cabinet minister visited the compound to mark Tisha B'Av, when Jews lament the temples' destruction. Israel regards all of Jerusalem as its indivisible and eternal capital, a claim not recognized internationally. Palestinians want East Jerusalem, annexed by Israel after the 1967 war, as the capital of a state they aspire to establish in the occupied West Bank and in the Gaza Strip.

Bomb kills two Turkish soldiers in Kurdish area
By AP, AFP/Sunday, 26 July 2015/Two Turkish soldiers were killed and four wounded in a car bomb attack on their convoy in the mainly Kurdish southeast of the country, the local governor's office said Sunday. The car bomb went off as the soldiers were travelling on a road in the Lice district of the Diyarbakir province late Saturday, the statement said, after the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) rebel group threatened to no longer observe a truce following Turkish air strikes on its positions in northern Iraq. Infographic: Bomb kills Turkish soldiers in Kurdish area.Turkey has started striking Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) militants, which helps the U.S.-led coalition, but also began attacking Kurds. The U.S. has been relying on Kurds associated with the Kurdistan Workers’ Party, or PKK, to make progress against ISIS. The United States condemned the attacks by PKK Kurdish militants in Turkey, a senior U.S. diplomat said on Twitter, adding there was “no connection” between Turkey’s strikes against the PKK and a deal to intensify the fight against ISIS.
“There is no connection between these airstrikes against PKK and recent understandings to intensify U.S.-Turkey cooperation against ISIL,” Brett McGurk, the deputy special presidential envoy for the coalition to counter ISIS, said on Twitter. Additionally, the White House said it welcomed Turkey’s increased focus and efforts to fight ISIS, and called the Kurdish militant PKK in Turkey a “terrorist” organization. The comments were made at a news briefing in Nairobi by a White House official during a visit to Kenya by U.S. President Barack Obama. Earlier on Sunday, the White House had said that Turkey has the right to defend itself against terrorist attacks by Kurdish rebels. White House spokesman Alistair Baskey strongly condemned recent terrorist attacks by the PKK, while also pointing out that Turkey is a NATO ally of the U.S. Baskey said the PKK should renounce terrorism and resume talks with Turkey’s government. But he also said that both sides should avoid violence and pursue de-escalation. Separately, Iran, an ally of President Bashar al-Assad, reacted Saturday to Turkey’s bombing of ISIS targets in Syria by urging respect for national sovereignty in the fight against “terrorism.”Asked to comment on the strikes, foreign ministry spokeswoman Marzieh Afkham said “all combat against terrorism should be done with respect to international rules and to the international sovereignty of states.” “Any action that leads to the weakening of national governments can, in effect, encourage terrorist groups to fulfil their criminal actions,” she added. Afkham also said Iran welcomes “international cooperation in the battle against terrorism.” That may have been a reference to the fact that Turkey, which has long backed the rebellion against Assad, did not coordinate the attacks with the Syrian regime. Iran is the principal regional ally of Assad, whose Alawite sect is an offshoot of Shiite Islam. Tehran provides both financial and military support to him in his battle against the mainly Sunni rebellion.

Egypt extends state of emergency in North Sinai
Reuters/Al Arabiya/Sunday, 26 July 2015/Egypt said on Saturday it had extended by three months a state of emergency imposed on parts of Northern Sinai in October after Islamist militants stepped up attacks in the peninsula bordering Israel, Gaza and the Suez Canal, according to Agence France-Presse. The decision, announced by Prime Minister Ibrahim Mehleb in a written decree on Saturday, will be implemented in Rafah, al-Arish, Sheikh Zuweid and surrounding areas starting on Sunday. It also extends a night-time curfew in place in the same areas. The measure was first introduced after 33 security personnel were killed in an attack in late October at a checkpoint in northern Sinai. It was extended three months in January and again in April. The October attack was claimed by Sinai Province, an affiliate of the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS), which earlier changed its name from Ansar Bayt al-Maqdis. The group, which aims to topple the government in Cairo, has mainly focused on targets in Sinai. Roadside bombing The announcement came shortly before a roadside bombing in the Sinai Peninsula wounded 18 police conscripts. Security officials said the blast Sunday morning targeted a bus carrying the conscripts in El-Arish as they traveled along a seafront road. Hospital officials confirmed the casualty figure and said none of those hurt had life-threatening wounds. Insurgents have killed hundreds of soldiers and policemen in Sinai since mid-2013, lashing out after then-army chief Abdel Fattah al-Sisi ousted Islamist President Mohammed Mursi following mass protests against his rule. Sisi went on to be elected president last year and says militancy poses an existential threat to Egypt, the most populous Arab country.

Iraq forces retake university on edge of Ramadi
By Reuters | Baghdad/Sunday, 26 July 2015/tskirts of Ramadi from the Islamic State group, seizing a key position for any offensive to retake the city, officials said. Iraqi forces had recaptured parts of Anbar University in May, shortly after losing the provincial capital to the jihadists, but later pulled back. The university was retaken by elite forces from Iraq’s Counter Terrorism Service (CTS), known as the “Golden Brigade”. “The Golden Brigade managed to liberate Anbar University with backing from the army as well as air support from the coalition and Iraqi aircraft,” Brigadier General Abdelamir al-Khazraji, deputy commander of CTS forces in Anbar, said. “Our forces liberated the university early Sunday and now have full control of it, following a week of fierce clashes,” he told AFP. “The Iraqi flag is flying above the university presidency once again,” he said. A statement from CTS said the Iraqi special forces had “inflicted heavy human and material losses to the enemy.”Ramadi Mayor Dalaf al-Kubaysi said: “What was left of the insurgents fled the area.”Anbar University’s vast compound lies south of the main highway that circles Ramadi from the south.Iraqi forces had retaken two neighbourhoods south of the highway and parts of the university campus days after the devastating May 17 fall of Ramadi. Infographic: Iraqi troops advance in Ramadi. They later pulled back as IS continued to attack Iraqi positions east of the city and commanders regrouped to organise a counteroffensive across the entire province. The US-led coalition formed a year ago when IS threatened to conquer even larger swathes of Iraq has carried out thousands of strikes in support of Iraqi regular forces. On July 24 alone, the US military said five air strikes in the Ramadi area destroyed IS positions and vehicles. Iraqi forces had held on to parts of Ramadi for nearly 18 months before buckling in the face of a three-day jihadist blitz during which IS unleashed an unprecedented number of truck bombs. The government is now focusing its military efforts on Anbar, a province which stretches west from the outskirts of Baghdad to the borders with Syria, Jordan and Saudi Arabia.

Finally... In garbage the Lebanese are united!
Mohamed Chebarro/Al Arabiya
Sunday, 26 July 2015
It is not an exaggeration to suggest that for once the Lebanese people could step back and watch how much of a dump their country has become! The garbage littering the streets is just another example and a result of the Lebanese internal political stalemate...
The Lebanese president's post has been vacant for over a year because some Lebanese will not endorse General Michel Aoun, a christian MP and leader of a pro Hezbollah christian block, as president of the republic. As a result. the MPs loyale to Aoun and those of his ally Hezbollah boycotted parliament sessions dedicated to electing a president. A simple majority of attendees is unconstitutional in Lebanon's parliamentary democracy.
It seems the heavy stench of rubbish in the hot and humid summer of Beirut is likely to linger for a while. The Lebanese government led by a middle way Sunni, Tamam Salam, is incapable of even renewing the contracts for garbage collectors and dumping sites, among other things, due to the abstention of General Aoun ministers in the cabinet meetings. Aoun's block insist on scrutinizing the priorities on the government agenda. This block deems appointing Aoun's son in law as head of the Lebanese army a priority that supersede discussions related to matters such citizens' security and hygiene! The Lebanese constitution vest the powers of the president in the Prime Minister once the post is vacant but the tradition is that the Prime Minister observes precedents and tries to rule consociationally.
Simple daily needs
And in so doing the government is failing its people on simple daily needs such as garbage collection. The parliament in Lebanon is also currently obsolete for similar reasons. Though it managed to extend the tenure for its serving MPs because of the failure to hold general elections, this parliament has long put the election of a president as a sole point on its agenda but that too is subject to Lebanese consociational and regionally linked politics. So it seems the heavy stench of rubbish in the hot and humid summer of Beirut is likely to linger for a while as state apparatus has come to a halt. The election of a president, it seems, is also subject to the ramifications of the Iranian nuclear deal and how it will impact on relations between Tehran and the international community and by default, how it will translate to discord or accord between the Lebanese various factions, and their allies and patrons in the region.
This alone is unlikely to push all parties in Lebanon to find and agree a new dumping site for the country's rubbish. Part of the problem, we are told, is the outcome of the battle fought by the Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and his Lebanese ally Hezbollah against the Syrian opposition that rose against Assad four years ago seeking a bit more freedom.. Other factors can also be cited, but In summary, every small and big decision in Lebanon is linked to the regional barometer and precarious balance of power in the Middle East varied conflicts, from Yemen to Iraq and from Syria to Palestine including Bahrain and Libya. All the above directly impacts on Lebanese consociational politics and deal making. So if all the above questions reach a settlement this decade or the next, Lebanese political parties, religious groups, or sects could differ in interpreting the outcome and subject the country to further inconclusive discords and conflict. Put simply, the Lebanese, all the Lebanese, should unite and pray collectively that a deal is reached soon on many of these questions and maybe then they can live without garbage on their streets. The garbage issue for once crosses the divides and affect all factions and sects in Lebanon, creating a rare consensus among the Lebanese to call on the state to act fast. Failure to do so my well tip this country and its people into the gutters of history.

Israel Confronts the Iran Nuclear Deal
Michael Herzog/Washington Institute/July 26, 2015
Israelis fear that the deal will legitimize Iran as a nuclear threshold state, embolden its highly destabilizing role in a volatile Middle East, and trigger nuclear proliferation and a conventional arms race in the region.
The Iran nuclear deal was met in Israel by an atmosphere of gloom, in stark contrast to the widespread celebration in the West and Iran. Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu characterized it as "a bad mistake of historic proportions," the cabinet unanimously rejected it, and leading opposition figures joined in slamming it. Ensuing opinion polls indicated that more than 70 percent of Israelis believe the deal is dangerous and will not block Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon.
Such reactions are not surprising, since Israelis believe the stakes are higher for them than for anyone else. Unlike the United States, Israel regards Iran and its radical axis as the most serious threat to its national security -- an assessment based squarely on Tehran's extreme ideology, its calls for eliminating Israel, its nuclear and regional ambitions, and its heavily armed proxies on Israel's borders (including Hezbollah and its estimated 100,000 rockets). Israelis do not believe the nuclear deal signifies a fundamental shift in Iran's strategic orientation, and they question the U.S. administration's resolve to block the regime's ambitions.
WHY ISRAELIS ARE CRITICIZING THE DEAL
The agreement distances Iran from the capacity to produce a nuclear weapon for the next ten to fifteen years, rolling back its capabilities and instituting measures to curb and monitor the nuclear program in a comprehensive and intrusive manner. Tehran may be discouraged from brazenly breaking out to nuclear military capabilities in the next few years, since doing so would explicitly defy major international stakeholders in a high-profile, formally enshrined agreement.
Yet buying this time and political space has come at a heavy price. The deal allows Tehran to maintain its nuclear infrastructure and advance its nuclear technical capabilities with international help. At the same time, Iran will be invited back into the community of nations, empowered politically and financially, and ultimately legitimized as a nuclear threshold state, with license to reduce breakout time to near zero fifteen years from now amid relaxed inspections.
Furthermore, certain deficiencies in the agreement may give Iran room to push the envelope as it has done for years, encroaching on the established breakout time before the deal's expiration. Prior to year ten, Iran will be allowed to research and produce advanced centrifuges, acquire nuclear-related commodities and services, and develop ballistic missiles capable of delivering nuclear weapons. Meanwhile, the monitoring and verification regime will exclude short-notice inspections of undeclared sites. Iran is to be given at least twenty-four days' notice, and the International Atomic Energy Agency must inform it in advance about the purpose of requested inspections at such sites -- giving Tehran an excuse to stall and time to potentially cover up most nuclear activities, especially those that do not involve fissile material or are conducted in small facilities. Moreover, the heavier sanctions are to be lifted in a matter of months, removing significant leverage before Iran is sufficiently tested. And it is not clear that this lifting is conditioned on Tehran satisfactorily addressing all concerns regarding the "possible military dimensions" of its program, which is essential for a credible inspections baseline.
For Iran, the price seems worth paying. The regime -- which has thus far been careful not to risk the consequences of breaking out -- can see the value of putting its nuclear ambitions on hold while gaining international recognition of its program and enjoying the power-projection benefits of a nuclear threshold state, all while boosting its regional standing and normalizing its international status. In addition to extending the regime's longevity, these gains could put it in a significantly better position -- politically, financially, militarily, and technologically -- to cross the critical threshold down the line, with no guarantee that it will be stopped. In Israel's eyes, this is a highly risky gamble.
Israel also takes seriously the potential unintended consequence of cascading nuclear proliferation in the Middle East. Any of the regional actors who feel threatened by Iran and do not sufficiently trust American assurances -- such as Saudi Arabia, Turkey, and Egypt -- may seek the same status granted to Tehran.
There is no less concern about the deal's regional implications. In a Middle East characterized by general meltdown, crumbling states, and violent sectarian strife, empowering Iran through a nuclear deal is akin to pouring fuel on the fire. The agreement represents legitimization, improved political standing, and access to considerable financial resources -- along with the $100-150 billion to be unfrozen by international banks, Israeli intelligence estimates that Iran stands to gain several hundred billion more from sanctions relief. These gains will likely embolden the regime's destabilizing activities in the region, which are not controlled by the Iranian officials who signed the deal. Such activities include arming Shiite proxies, playing the Shiite sectarian card, supporting designated terrorist groups, fueling subversion, and launching cyberattacks. Enabling Iran to expand its support for Hezbollah or its role as a spoiler in Israel's shaky relations with the Palestinians could prove particularly challenging.
Therefore, while the deal focuses on the nuclear dimension, Israel and many of its Arab neighbors cannot ignore its prospective impact on Iran's nonnuclear policies. The agreement itself blurs some of these lines, for example by committing to lift sanctions on Iranian entities that are highly active in the realms of terrorism (e.g., the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps-Qods Force and numerous banks) or conventional weapons. Iran will have more funds and motivation to arm itself (along with its proxies, as described above), and lifting the UN arms embargo in the next five years will only exacerbate the situation. Even apart from the potential for nuclear proliferation, major regional actors who feel threatened by Iran will seek conventional deterrent tools to counter it, creating an accelerated arms race into which Israel will inevitably be dragged. Russia will likely fuel this race on the Iranian side, and the United States on the other side by "compensating" its traditional allies.
Going forward, regional actors expect Washington to broaden the narrow focus it assumed throughout the negotiations and adopt a comprehensive, assertive strategy to stem Iran's hegemonic ambitions. Yet Israelis question whether things will change once the agreement is implemented, since the United States will be heavily invested in the deal's success and may seek to expand cooperation with Iran beyond fighting the so-called "Islamic State"/ISIS -- possibly shifting away from its traditional allies in the process.
Perhaps the biggest concern is the belief that Washington's enforcement tools against Iran have significantly eroded. There is a broad consensus in Israel that the U.S. administration could have secured a better agreement by projecting enhanced deterrence and showing less evident eagerness for a deal. Instead, however, it consistently devalued American and Israeli military options, then presented a false binary choice between a deal and war. Leverage on Iran will now be considerably weakened, since the agreement promises to bring early sanctions relief, boost the nuclear program's cyberdefense capabilities, and complicate any future reimposition of sanctions. Indeed, the mechanism for "snapback" sanctions is cumbersome, applies to only exceptional cases of flagrant violations (i.e., undefined cases of "significant non-performance"), includes a grandfather clause that is open to interpretation, and implicitly expires after a decade. Moreover, as with any enforcement tool, applying this mechanism will require political will -- a commodity that Israelis fear may be in short supply once trade restrictions are lifted and Western officials weigh the agreement's explicit threat of Iranian noncompliance if sanctions are reimposed.
No one knows whether the deal will have a positive transformative effect on Iran over the long run. That is a hopeful bet. Whatever the case, Israelis do not believe that sufficient safeguards are in place if things go wrong.
IMPLICATIONS FOR U.S.-ISRAELI RELATIONS
The new reality forced on Israel will limit its immediate options to highlighting the deal's dangers and deficiencies -- in diplomatic circles, the court of public opinion, and Congress -- and reinforcing mutual interests with other regional actors who dislike the deal. Plans for actively thwarting Iran's nuclear program, though still in place, will presumably have to wait so long as Tehran does not dangerously advance its capabilities.
While most Israelis agree on the deal's risks, there is a policy debate on how best to address them, especially in the American theater. Some believe that the deal is a fait accompli and fighting it head-on would exact a political price on crucial U.S.-Israel relations. In their view, Israel should instead embark on a quiet dialogue with the Obama administration to secure assurances and understandings. Conversely, the decisionmakers strongly believe that Israeli concerns are not taken seriously enough -- given the high stakes, they believe it is imperative to sound an unequivocal critical voice in the current public debate, which may ultimately lead to serious discussion of the risks.
If the nuclear deal is implemented, it will be tested over the years, but so will U.S.-Israeli relations. For now, the relationship is characterized by a clash of worldviews, but the two allies will have to seriously discuss Israel's strategic concerns once the dust settles. In particular, they should seek common ground in addressing the deal's weak links, revamping deterrence against Iran's destabilizing regional policies, providing assurances about what will happen once the deal expires, and enhancing Israel's margins of security.
**Brig. Gen. Michael Herzog, IDF (Ret.), is The Washington Institute's Milton Fine International Fellow and former head of the IDF's Strategic Planning Division. He recently authored the Institute report "Contextualizing Israeli Concerns about the Iran Nuclear Deal."

Assad: Iran deal is proof that we must not compromise
Roi Kais/Ynetnews /Latest Update: 07.26.15/Israel News
Syrian president gives speech praising Iran's nuclear agreement, attacking Western hypocrisy, and signaling that the four-year civil war is not about to end n a compromise. Syrian President Bashar Assad on Sunday praised Iran for its agreement with world powers and attacked the West for its "hypocritical" approach to the civil war that has ravaged his country for four years. "The nations that are devoted to their rights must win," said the embattled Syrian leader in his first public address in months. "Iran is the best proof for this in terms of its achievements in the nuclear department."Assad described the nuclear agreement as a great victory for Iran. "This is a country that was under siege for three decades and was at war for eight years, in which its infrastructure was destroyed, and despite this, it is the first in the Islamic world in terms of nuclear production and industry." The Syrian president also said that Western nations define events as terrorism when they are the target, but call them liberty and revolution when they affect its enemies. "When the criteria are consistent and the revolutionaries are considered terrorists, and the opposition forces are considered little collaborators, then the West will speak clearly," he said. "Or to the contrary, when they allow the opposition in their nations to take up arms and fight, then we will believe them." Assad added that "the West's goal today is only to manage terror and not eradicate it. What they do has caused terror to grow and has not defeated it."Assad also praised Hezbollah for its support in Syria, but emphasized that no one could replace Syria's army in the fighting.
Loss of territory
Assad acknowledged that his generals have had to move forces from one front to another in order to protect areas that are militarily, politically or economically important. He added that the loss of some areas to insurgents has led to "frustration" among Syrians. "Sometimes, in some circumstances, we are forced to give up areas to move those forces to the areas that we want to hold onto," he said. "We must define the important regions that the armed forces hold onto so it doesn't allow the collapse of the rest of the areas." Syrian forces have suffered several setbacks since March, including the loss of the northwestern city of Idlib, the capital of a province that borders Turkey. In May the government lost the historic central town of Palmyra to IS extremists, who also captured parts of the northeastern city of Hassakeh. Assad tried to justify the loss of some areas, including Idlib. Assad-allied forces, including fighters from the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah and Iranian advisers, control a little less than half of Syria's 185,000 square kilometers (71,400 square miles). "It was necessary to specify critical areas for our armed forces to hang on to," Assad said. "Concern for our soldiers forces us to let go of some areas." "When we concentrate our forces in an important area, what happens is that we bring reinforcements but this is usually at the expense of other areas," Assad said. "Sometimes we have to abandon some areas in order to transfer these forces to the area that we want to hold."
Assad said increased support from states backing the rebels – including Turkey – was the reason for recent setbacks that had created "a state of despair" among Syrians. Syria is in a war funded by the richest and most powerful states, he said. But Assad struck a defiant tone, saying there would be no compromise solutions, and he dismissed the view that Syria was heading towards partition into areas run separately by the Damascus government and armed groups fighting him. "Everything is available (for the army), but there is a shortfall in human capacity," Assad said. "Despite that, I don't want to give a dark image that hostile media will use to say that the president is saying that people are not joining the army."Assad said that in recent months, mostly in April and May, the number of people joining the army has increased. He added: "Every inch of Syria is precious."
"We are not collapsing. We are steadfast and will achieve victory," said Assad, who was interrupted several times by applause. "Defeat does not exist in the dictionary of the Syrian Arab army." Assad's government announced a general amnesty for army deserters and draft dodgers Saturday. There are thousands of army deserters in and outside Syria, many of whom have gone on to fight with rebels. Many young men have fled the country to avoid compulsory military conscription. Assad has issued similar amnesties for criminals, but has not released any of the thousands of political prisoners believed to be in Syria's prisons. The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights recently reported that at least 49,100 troops and 32,500 pro-government gunmen have been killed since the uprising began in March 2011.
The group, which gathers information from activists inside Syria, says there are some 70,000 draft dodgers in government-controlled areas alone.Last month, Syria's prime minister called on young men to fulfill their mandatory military service obligation, promising better pay for troops on the front lines as well as one hot meal a day. Assad said his government did not want war, "but when it was imposed on us, the Syrian Arab army repelled the terrorists everywhere." The US has begun training some moderate rebels who oppose Assad, but Islamic extremist groups have had the most success against his forces. The Islamic State group holds about a third of Syria and neighboring Iraq in its self-declared "caliphate."Speaking about political dialogue, Assad said any initiative that is not based on fighting "terrorism" will be "hollow" and "meaningless."
**Reuters and the Associated Press contributed to this report.

Islamist "Justice": Slow Painful Death for Christian Mother in Pakistan
Raymond Ibrahim/Gatestone Institute/July 26, 2015
http://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/6224/islamist-justice-pakistan
While working as a farm laborer on a hot day, Asia Bibi was told to fetch water. When she returned, Muslim coworkers refused to drink from the water, saying it was unclean because a Christian had touched it. Six years later, Asia Bibi still has not been executed. Instead, sick, isolated, and regularly beaten by both prison guards and Muslim inmates, she has evidently been left to rot to death. Every time any Western organization calls for her release, Pakistani Muslims threaten to take Sharia law into their own hands. One mosque prayer leader has even offered $6000 to anyone who kills her -- a strong incentive, since many in Pakistan would probably kill her for free. According to Islamic law, the word of a Christian is not valid against the word of a Muslim. Accusations of blasphemy against Christians by Muslims routinely result in the Christians being imprisoned, beaten, and sometimes killed -- in some cases even without evidence. Pakistan does not require proof of a crime, only allegations -- often made for extraneous reasons, and totally unfounded. Pakistan's authorities appear to have found a solution to at least one of their problems in the international arena: Aasiya Noreen -- or "Asia Bibi" -- a 50-year-old Christian woman and mother of five, who has been on death row for six years for allegedly insulting Muhammad.
Instead of executing Asia Bibi and further advertising to the international community that theirs is a savage and backwards nation -- and instead of releasing her and provoking millions of angry Muslims to turn on the government and accuse it of supporting "apostasy" -- Pakistan's authorities appear to be letting time, wretched conditions, severe maltreatment, and beatings slowly kill her. Asia Bibi and two of her five children, pictured prior to her imprisonment. Recent reports state that she is deathly ill and "so weak she could hardly walk." Mission Network News says that Asia Bibi has "internal bleeding, abdominal pain, and is vomiting blood. If she does not receive immediate medical care, she could die."According to Bruce Allen of Forgotten Missionaries International, "She suffers terrible pain, and she can hardly eat. ... Here's this woman, languishing in a prison under this death sentence for a crime that she vehemently denies."
In June 2009, while working as a farm laborer on a hot day, Asia Bibi was told to fetch water. Because she had drunk some of the water, the Muslim workers refused it: both the cup and the water were, they said, unclean because a Christian had touched them. (See this video of an Egyptian cleric saying how disgusted he is by Christians and how he could not drink from a cup that was merely touched by a Christian.) Before the "cup" incident, it seems, a feud between Asia and one of her Muslim neighbors concerning property damage had existed. After the "cup" incident, her enemies and some of the Muslim workers complained to a Muslim cleric. They accused Asia Bibi of making insulting statements about the Muslim prophet, Muhammad. Her official "crime," therefore, which she vehemently denies, is "insulting" the Muslim prophet Muhammad.
Shortly after the complaint was registered, a mob stormed her home and severely beat her and her family, including her children. They put a noose around her neck and dragged her through the streets. She was then arrested; and in November 2010, a Punjabi court fined her and sentenced her to death by hanging, in accordance to Section 295-C, which prohibits on pain of death any insult against the Muslim prophet Muhammad.Because her case attracted attention and condemnation from the international community, six years later, she still, mercifully, has not been executed. Instead, however, sick, isolated and regularly beaten by prison guards and Muslim inmates, she has evidently been left to rot to death.
In late 2011, a female prison-officer -- assigned to provide security for Asia -- was discovered beating her, "allegedly because of the Muslim officer's anti-Christian bias, while other staff members deployed for her security looked on in silence." In late December 2013, Asia Bibi, a Catholic, sent a message to Pope Francis, saying that, "only God will be able to free me. ... I also hope that every Christian has been able to celebrate the Christmas just past with joy. Like many other prisoners, I also celebrated the birth of the Lord in prison in Multan, here in Pakistan... I would have liked to be in St. Peter's for Christmas to pray with you, but I trust in God's plan for me and hopefully it will be achieved next year."
It was not. In 2014, a Pakistani court upheld her death penalty. Recently, Pope Francis called for clemency for Asia Bibi while the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom pressed the Obama administration to designate Pakistan a "country of particular concern."Last year, Kentucky Senator Rand Paul, citing Asia Bibi in particular, as well others, called for the use of the $900 million in U.S. aid to Pakistan as leverage to help persecuted religious minorities. If these funds are not used as leverage, nearly $1 billion in U.S. aid can be seen as "rewarding" Pakistan for being openly unjust to its minorities. Christian minorities are still arrested for "defaming Muhammad" -- that is, if a Muslim mob does not get to them first and burn them alive, as happened to a Christian couple last year, and as was recently attempted against a mentally disabled Christian man.
According to Wilson Chowdhry of the British Pakistani Christian Association:
Asia Bibi is by no means the only Christian on death row for blasphemy in Pakistan. There are a number of others, and there are also other Christians who are in there for crimes they did not commit, and are in effect in there because they are Christians.
People have to contact leaders of their nations and ask them to engage on dialogue with the Pakistani government for humanitarian rights alone renew the primary place of human rights when they engage in dialogue with foreign governments which habitually violate them. We see what happens when someone tries to challenge the blasphemy laws in Pakistan, it got two key politicians killed. In a country with such animosity against Christians, I don't believe a Supreme Court judge will be brave enough to exonerate her. A report from 2012 found that "Since 1990 alone, fifty-two people have been extra-judicially murdered on charges of blasphemy" in Pakistan. Yet every time any Western entity calls for her release, Pakistani Muslims threaten to take Sharia law into their own hands and murder her. Five years ago, a mosque prayer leader announced that anyone who manages to kill her would be rewarded with $6,000. It is a strong incentive, considering that many in Pakistan would probably kill her for free.
As Asia Bibi's husband, Ashiq Masih, puts it:
The Maulvis [clerics] want her dead. They have announced a prize of Rs 10,000 to Rs 500,000 (£60 to £3,200) for anyone who kills Asia. They have even declared that if the court acquits her they will ensure the death sentence stands.
"I am planning our protection. If she is set free I hope we are moved to a safer country, as Pakistan cannot protect her. "She has not made any mistake. We all know she has not committed any crime. We all know how Pakistan treats Christians. She was framed, she never committed any crime."
Even some of those who have stood up for Asia Bibi have been murdered: two of her most prominent advocates, Governor Salmaan Taseer and Minority Affairs Minister Shabaz Bhatti, were both slaughtered. Taseer was shot twenty-seven times by Mumtaz Qadri -- his own bodyguard -- as he left his mother's home. The bodyguard cited as his motive that the governor was supportive of a Christian woman accused of blasphemy.
After the murder, more than 500 Muslim clerics voiced support for the crime, and further pushed for a general boycott of Taseer's funeral. Supporters of Mumtaz Qadri blocked police who were attempting to arrest him, and some supporters showered him with rose petals. As for Bhatti, a Christian, Taliban-linked Muslims murdered him for his outspoken position against Pakistan's blasphemy law and his support for Asia Bibi. His car was ambushed and sprayed with bullets. A letter left at the scene said that anyone who tried to tamper with Pakistan's blasphemy law would suffer the same fate.
Bhatti, who received innumerable death threats, predicted his own murder. In a prerecorded video released after his death, he said, "I believe in Jesus Christ who has given his own life for us ... and I am ready to die for a cause ... I am living for my community ... and I will die to defend their rights."The investigation into his murder was so lax (a series of suspects were freed) that it has been suggested that the Pakistani government may have been involved in -- or at least sympathetic to -- his assassination, for being a Christian and opposed to the blasphemy law. Pakistan does not require proof of a crime, only allegations -- often made for extraneous reasons, and totally unfounded. Pakistanis' extreme sensitivity to any potential insult to Muhammad is reflected in several laws in the nation's penal code. Section 295-C reads:
Whoever by words, either spoken or written or by visible representation, or by any imputation, innuendo, or insinuation, directly or indirectly, defiles the sacred name of the Holy Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) shall be punished with death, or imprisonment for life, and shall also be liable to fine.
Because non-Muslims -- particularly Christians, who by definition are known to reject Muhammad's prophecy -- are more likely to be suspected of blasphemy, and because, according to Islamic law, the word of a Christian is not valid against the word of a Muslim, blasphemy accusations by Muslims against Christians routinely result in the Christians being imprisoned, beaten and killed. Sometimes the accused is killed even when there is no evidence.
In Pakistan, this scenario plays itself out over and over again. Christians, who reportedly make up less than one percent of the population in Pakistan, are especially vulnerable to charges of blasphemy.
Years before Asia Bibi was falsely accused, in 1994, Amnesty International reported:
Several dozen people have been charged with blasphemy in Pakistan over the last few years; in all the cases known to Amnesty International, the charges of blasphemy appear to have been arbitrarily brought, founded solely on the individuals' minority religious beliefs. . . . The available evidence in all these cases suggests that charges were brought as a measure to intimidate and punish members of minority religious communities . . . hostility towards religious minority groups appeared in many cases to be compounded by personal enmity, professional or economic rivalry or a desire to gain political advantage. As a consequence, Amnesty International has concluded that most of the individuals now facing charges of blasphemy, or convicted on such charges, are prisoners of conscience, detained solely for their real or imputed religious beliefs in violation of their right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion.
The British Pakistani Christian Association has started a petition calling for Bibi's release, and offers more ways to help Asia's case and help her husband Ashiq with legal fees.
In a recent interview, Asia Bibi's husband said:
"I really love her and miss her presence. I cannot sleep at night as I miss her. I miss her smile; I miss everything about her. She is my soulmate. I cannot see her in prison. It breaks my heart. Life has been non-existent without her. ... My children cry for their mother, they are broken. But I try to give them hope where I can."
**Raymond Ibrahim is author of Crucified Again: Exposing Islam's New War in Christians (published by Regnery in cooperation with Gatestone Institute, April 2013).

Turkey Uses ISIS as Excuse to Attack Kurds
by Uzay Bulut/Gatestone Institute/July 26, 2015
http://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/6223/turkey-isis-kurds
It appears as if the Turkish government is using ISIS as a pretext to attack the PKK (Kurdistan Workers' Party).
Turkey just announced that its air base at Incirlik will soon be open to coalition forces, presumably to fight ISIS. But the moment Turkey started bombing, it targeted Kurdish positions in Iraq, in addition to targeting ISIS positions in Syria.
In Turkey, millions of indigenous Kurds are continually terrorized and murdered, but ISIS terrorists can freely travel and use official border crossings to go to Syria and return to Turkey; they are even treated at Turkish hospitals.
If this is how the states that rule over Kurds treat them, why is there even any question as to whether the Kurds should have their own self-government?
Turkey's government seems to be waging a new war against the Kurds, now struggling to get an internationally recognized political status in Syrian Kurdistan.
On July 24, Turkish media sources reported that Turkish jet fighters bombed Kurdish PKK (Kurdistan Workers' Party) bases in Qandil, in Iraqi Kurdistan, as well as the Islamic State (ISIS) in Syria.
Turkey is evidently unsettled by the rapprochement the PKK seems to be establishing with the U.S. and Europe. Possibly alarmed by the PKK's victories against ISIS, as well as its strengthening international standing, Ankara, in addition to targeting ISIS positions in Syria, has been bombing the PKK positions in the Qandil mountains of Iraqi Kurdistan, where the PKK headquarters are located.
There is no ISIS in Qandil.
As expected, many Turkish media outlets were more enthusiastic about the Turkish air force's bombing the Kurdish militia than about bombing ISIS. "The camps of the PKK," they excitedly reported, "have been covered with fire."
It appears as if Turkey's ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) is using ISIS as a pretext to attack the PKK. Ankara just announced that its air base at Incirlik will soon be open to coalition forces, presumably to fight ISIS, but the moment Turkey started bombing, it targeted Kurdish positions. Those attacks not only open a new era of death and destruction, but also bring an end to all possibilities of resolving Turkey's Kurdish issue non-violently.
Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu announced that
"a second wave operation against Daesh [ISIS] in Syria was started. Just after that, a very comprehensive operation was carried out against the camps of the terrorist organization PKK in northern Iraq. I am glad that the targets were hit with great success. We have given instructions to start a third wave operation in Syria and a second wave operation in Iraq."
The "great success" of the Turkish military has brought much damage and injury to even Kurdish civilians -- including children. The Kurdish newspaper Rudaw reported that two Kurdish villagers in Duhok's Berwari region were carried to hospital in the aftermath of a Turkish artillery bombardment in the Amediye region. One of the victims was 12 years old. The second victim lost a leg in an airstrike. Four members of the PKK were killed and several others were injured.
Shortly after military operations against the PKK started, access to the websites of pro-Kurdish newspapers and news agencies was denied "by decree of court." These websites -- including Fırat News Agency (ANF), Dicle News Agency (DIHA), Hawar News Agency (ANHA), Ozgur Gundem newspaper, Yuksekova News, Rudaw and BasNews -- are still blocked in Turkey.
ISIS, meanwhile, has not so far made any statement regarding Turkey's so-called bombings of ISIS in any of its media outlets.
Had Turkish military attacked the PKK alone, and not in addition to attacking ISIS, it would probably have received widespread international condemnation. So to add "legitimacy" to its attacks against the Kurdish PKK -- whose affiliate Democratic Union Party (PYD) in Syria and its armed wing, the Kurdish People's Defense Units (YPG) have been resisting ISIS and other Islamist terrorist groups since 2013 -- Turkey declared that it will also attack ISIS. This would give it cover for its attacks against Kurdish fighters.
In 2014, Turkey's President Recep Tayyip Erdogan described the plan he wanted to carry out in Syria and Iraq: "The problem in Syria should be taken into account. Iraq too should be considered similarly. Moreover, there needs to be a solution that will also deal with the Syrian wing [PYD] of the separatist terrorist organization [PKK]."
The AKP government, dissatisfied with the results of last month's parliamentary elections, also seems to want to hold new elections, to push the mainly Kurdish HDP Party below the required 10% threshold, and thus force them out of parliament. Perhaps the government thinks that bombing the PKK will generate Turkish nationalist enthusiasm that will work in the AKP's favor to help it regain a majority in early elections.
Apparently, Turkey does not need Kurdish deputies in its parliament. Apparently, the state prefers to slaughter or arrest the Kurds -- as it has done for decades. Why hold talks and reach a democratic resolution when you have the power to murder people wholesale?[1]
Sadly, Turkey has preferred not to form a "Turkish-Kurdish alliance" to destroy ISIS. First, Turkey has opened its borders to ISIS, enabling the growth of the terrorist group. And now, at the first opportunity, it is bombing the Kurds again. According to this strategy, "peace" will be possible only when Kurds submit to Turkish supremacism and abandon their goal of being an equal nation.
In the meantime, Mevlut Cavusoglu, Turkish minister of foreign affairs, said that the Incirlik air base in Turkey has not yet been opened for use by the U.S. and other coalition forces, but that it will be opened in the upcoming period.
Kurdish forces, therefore, are the only forces that are truly resisting the Islamic State.
They have been repressed by Baghdad and murdered by Turkey and Iran.
If this is how the states that rule over Kurds treat them, why is there even any question as to whether the Kurds should have their own self-government?
As a result of the ISIS attacks in the region, the Kurdish PKK -- as well as its Syrian Kurdish affiliate, Democratic Union Party (PYD) and its armed wing, Kurdish People's Defense Units (YPG) -- have emerged as the America's most effective battlefield partners against ISIS. Ever since ISIS became a major force in Syria, the U.S. has apparently relied heavily on YPG to stop ISIS from advancing. According to Henri Barkey, a former State Department specialist on Turkey, "The U.S. has become the YPG's air force and the YPG has become the U.S.'s ground force in Syria."
* * *
Attacks on the Kurds were already under way last week. On July 20, a bomb attack in the Kurdish town of Suruc (Pirsus) in Turkey killed 32 people during a meeting of young humanitarian activists, who were discussing the reconstruction of the neighboring Kurdish town of Kobane.
The scene of the suicide bombing in Suruc, Turkey. An ISIS suicide bomber murdered 32 people and wounded more than 100 others in a July 20 attack on Kurdish humanitarian activists. (Image source: VOA video screenshot)
The blast took place while the activists were making a statement to the press in the garden of a cultural center. At least 100 others, mostly university students, were wounded. (Graphic video of the explosion)
The suicide bomber was identified through DNA testing, according to reports in the Turkish news media. Seyh Abdurrahman Alagoz was reportedly a 20-year-old Turkish university student, recently returned from Syria, and believed to have had ties to ISIS.
Alagoz targeted a meeting 300 secular activists, members of the Federation of Socialist Youth Associations (SGDF), who gathered at a cultural center in the province of Urfa, opposite the Kurdish town of Kobane in Syrian Kurdistan. As part of an effort to rebuild Kobane, they were preparing to provide aid, give toys to the children there and build a hospital, school, nursery, children's park, library and a memorial forest for those who had lost their lives in Kobane.
"Work on the building of hospitals and schools needs to be done," Oguz Yuzgec, the co-president of the federation, said before the explosion. "One of the things we will do is to build a children's park in Kobane. We will name it after Emre Aslan, who died fighting in Kobane. We are collecting toys. We will participate in the construction of the nursery that the canton of Kobane is planning to build. We have the responsibility of helping the nursery function. We need everybody who knows how to draw and can teach children."
Mazlum Demirtas, a survivor of the attack, said: "The main one responsible for this incident is the state of Turkey, the AKP fascism, the AKP dictatorship. ... It attacked us with its gunmen and gangs. Since yesterday, parents have been collecting the dismembered body parts of their children. They are trying to identify the dismembered bodies. This is called fascism, inhumanity and barbarity."
Pinar Gayip, another survivor of the attack, said in a telephone interview on the pro-government Haberturk TV that, "Instead of helping the wounded, the murderer-police of the murderer-AKP threw tear gas at the vehicles with which we carried the wounded." She was taken off the air.
All across Turkish Kurdistan, there were protests condemning the massacre and the government's alleged involvement in it. Police in Istanbul used plastic bullets and water cannons against people who gathered to remember those murdered in Suruc.
The Turkish authorities briefly blocked access to Twitter last Wednesday to prevent the people from viewing photos of the bombing in Suruc. Officials admitted that Turkey had asked Twitter to remove 107 URLs (web addresses) with images related to the bombing; before the ban, Twitter had already removed 50.
Selahattin Demirtas, the co-chair of the pro-Kurdish Peoples' Party (HDP), said that state surveillance activities were intensive in Suruc, and that the intelligence service was recording the identity of everyone traveling to and from Suruc.
As Demirtas's own convoy had recently not been permitted to enter Suruc, he emphasized the extent of state surveillance in the town, and said that nobody could argue that someone could have managed to infiltrate the crowd and carry out the suicide attack without state support.
"Today, we have witnessed in Suruc yet again what an army of barbarity and rape, an army that has lost human dignity, can do," Demirtas said. "Those who have been silent in the face of ISIS, who have not dared even raise their voice to it, as well as the officials in Ankara who threaten even the HDP every day but caress the head of ISIS, are the accomplices of this barbarity."
In the meantime, Mehmet Gormez, the head of the Turkish Presidency of Religious Affairs (Diyanet), announced on its Twitter account that the perpetrators of the Suruc attack do not have religion.
However, three days before the massacre in Suruc, about 100 Islamists -- alleged to be ISIS sympathizers -- had performed mass Islamic Eid prayers in Istanbul. They demanded Islamic sharia law instead of democracy. ISIS sympathizers had performed the same Eid prayers at the same place the year before, as well.
Over the border in Syrian Kurdistan, shortly after the blast in Suruc, a suicide bomber detonated a car bomb at a checkpoint in Kobane. Two Kurdish fighters were killed in the explosion, according to Rami Abdel Rahman, director of the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.
Last month, a deadly blast hit the Kurdish province of Diyarbakir in Turkey, during an election rally of the pro-Kurdish HDP that was attended by tens of thousands of people. Just before the HDP co-chair Selahattin Demirtas was going to speak, two bombs exploded at different places. Four people were killed, and more than 100 people are estimated to have been wounded. One of the wounded, Lisa Calan, 28, a Kurdish art director from Diyarbakir, lost both legs in the explosion.
As the wounded were being carried to hospitals, police used tear gas against people trying to run from the area in panic
The bomber was reported to be a member of ISIS.
* * *
In Turkey, millions of indigenous Kurds are continually terrorized and murdered, while ISIS terrorists can freely travel and use official border crossings to go to Syria and return to Turkey; they are even treated at Turkish hospitals. Emrah Cakan, for instance, a Turkish-born ISIS commander wounded in Syria, got medical treatment at the university hospital in Turkey's Denizli province in March.
The Denizli governor's office issued a written statement on 5 March:
"The treatment of Emrah C. at the Denizli hospital was started upon his own application. The procedural acts concerning his injury were conducted by our border city during his entry to our country and they still continue. And his treatment procedures continue as a part of his right to benefit from health services just like all our other citizens have."
The "compassion" and hospitality that many Turkish institutions have for ISIS members is not even hidden. The silence of the West is mystifying and disappointing.
The U.S. government cooperates with oppressive regimes -- including the terrorist regime of Iran, under which Kurds are forced to live -- to the detriment of the Kurds, to the detriment other persecuted peoples, and to the detriment of the future of the West.
Many Middle Eastern regimes are ruled by Islamist, often genocidal governments -- so there is not much to expect from them in terms of human rights and liberties.
The Kurds need real support, real arms and real recognition. Otherwise, there does not seem to be much difference between the dictatorial, genocidal Middle Eastern regimes and the West, which used to represent democracy and freedom.
Uzay Bulut, born and raised a Muslim, is a Turkish journalist based in Ankara.
[1] The so-called "peace process" was reportedly started in 2012 and through it, Kurds and the Turkish government were to resolve the Kurdish issue through negotiations.)

Turkey’s double trouble: ISIS and the PKK
Brooklyn Middleton/Al Arabiya/Sunday, 26 July 2015
The past several days in southeastern Turkey have seen significant bloodshed followed by high tensions and widespread unrest that has spilled over into Istanbul and Ankara. On 20 July, a 20 year old Turkish national, identified as Abdurrahman Alagöz and suspected of having ties to ISIS, detonated his explosives-laden body at a cultural center in southeastern Turkey’s Suruc province. The explosion ripped through a gathering of Socialist Youth Association (SGDF) members, who were discussing how to rebuild the war-torn Syrian Kurdish town of Kobane. The blast killed at least 32 people and injured another 104. Following the deadly attack, demonstrations and unrest broke out across the southeast as well as Ankara and Istanbul. As protesters condemned the perceived failure of the Turkish government to prevent the attack, the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) began plotting. During evening hours local time on 21 July, PKK cadres killed at least one man they alleged was an ISIS fighter in Istanbul while another man accused of supporting the militant group was shot dead in his house in Adana province the following day. Later on 22 July, two days days after the suspected ISIS bombing, PKK cadres fatally shot two Turkish police officers inside the men’s shared private residence in Şanlıurfa province. The militant group quickly claimed responsibility for the revenge attack, noting that, "A punitive action was carried out... in revenge for the massacre in Suruç.” Deadly PKK ambushes continued on 23 July with two masked gunmen shooting one policeman dead and injuring another in Diyarbakır province.
It is worth noting that even prior to the deadly attack in Suruc and the retaliatory PKK attacks, tensions between the militant group and Ankara had steadily and significantly increased recently. On 11 July, the Group of Communities in Kurdistan (KCK), released a written statement indicating PKK fighters would no longer uphold the tenuous ceasefire agreed in 2013, due to perceived violations by Turkey. According to Rudaw Kurdish website, the statement read, “Our guerrillas with responsibility pledged themselves to honor the ceasefire since the beginning of the process, but the Turkish government with its arbitrary actions has already resumed the war against the Kurdish people….The government has started the war against the Kurds and we will not remain silent.”
Meanwhile, hours after PKK militants ambushed two police officers in Diyakibir, ISIS extremists once again targeted Turkey, opening deadly fire across the Syrian border and killing at least one Turkish soldier while injuring at least two others in Killis province. The Turkish military immediately returned fire and mobilized their air force. The deadly flare-up of violence between Turkey and the PKK can still deescalate in the immediate term. Within several hours of the latest ISIS attack, Ankara announced a major shift in their policy: The United States-led coalition will now be able to launch attacks on ISIS from Turkey’s İncirlik base. The decision had reportedly been made weeks ago but the timing of the announcement is indeed relevant to note.
For a fleeting moment, it appeared as though Turkey was prioritizing the threat of ISIS over the threat of the PKK. But, following the announcement, the Turkish airforce aerially bombarded ISIS positions in Syria as well as PKK bases in Iraqi Kurdistan – the latter of which, according to the PKK, killed not only four of the group’s fighters but destroyed whatever remained of the ceasefire. Since pre-dawn hours on July 24, Ankara has confirmed that the Turkish air force has carried out at least two rounds of airstrikes targeting PKK positions – the first since 2013 - and at least three rounds of airstrikes targeting ISIS. To note, Ankara had in fact more aggressively targeted ISIS in the recent term even prior to the Suruc bombing. Turkish security forces detained at least 45 suspected ISIS militants – all reportedly foreign nationals - in a three day period from 9-12 July in Gaziantep; those arrests followed the detainment of at least 21 other suspected ISIS fighters in Istanbul, Kocaeli, and several other locations during that same period.
ISIS carrying out attacks on and near Turkish soil while the PKK simultaneously resumes targeting Turkish security forces is the materialization of the country’s main security threats and likely many civilians’ worst fears. With the Suruc bombing clearly underscoring the fact that Turkey remains as susceptible as ever to a mass casualty ISIS attack, it is unlikely the country can risk entering into a sustained broader conflict with the PKK at this stage.
Turkey’s right to self defense. Meanwhile, a prolonged resumption of hostilities between the PKK and Turkish security forces will only further complicate the U.S.-led coalition’s efforts to combat ISIS. It is worth reiterating here, that this is the same coalition that Turkey just offered major support to and the same coalition which needs Kurdish support. In a carefully worded five-series tweet, Deputy Special Presidential Envoy for the Global Coalition to Counter ISIS, Brett McGurk, noted U.S. support for “Turkey’s right to self defense,” but also urged de-escalation between the two parties. Most importantly, McGurk stated, “There is no connection between these airstrikes against PKK and recent understandings to intensify U.S.-Turkey cooperation against #ISIL.” The statement is unlikely to quell Kurdish fighters,’ instrumental in the fight against ISIS, fury with Ankara.
As Turkish security forces continue making mass counter-terror arrests – 590 suspected ISIS and PKK militants were detained in the last few days alone – efforts to prevent another major attack are likely to be stymied if Ankara continues fighting on two fronts at the same time. The deadly flare-up of violence between Turkey and the PKK can still deescalate in the immediate term and must do so if Ankara’s commitment to aiding the U.S.-coalition in battling ISIS is to be long term. That said, Ankara deciding to now allow the U.S. to use its territory in its ongoing aerial offensive to attack ISIS could prove beneficial on two fronts domestically. The policy change could signal that Ankara is increasingly serious about thwarting ISIS, quelling some tension, and most importantly, can ultimately help prevent another major ISIS massacre on Turkish soil.

What is the matter with America?
Hisham Melhem/Al Arabiya/Sunday, 26 July 2015
In 2004, American journalist and historian Thomas Frank published a book entitled ‘What is the matter with Kansas? How conservatives won the heart of America’, in which he explored the reasons why so many citizens vote against their own economic and political interests. The phenomenon of individuals ‘betraying’ their social class is well known, and the history of left-wing activism in the twentieth century is full of examples of leftist and Marxist leaders betraying their privileged classes and leading the charge of the downtrodden, against the entrenched economic and political order. Frank’s book is a complex and fascinating tale, told in penetrating, witty and at times hilarious prose, of the slow transformation of his native Kansas from a left-leaning state in the 19th century, into a hotbed of conservatism in recent decades.
Frank delineates how the conservative Republicans framed the issues in deceptive ways, how they distorted political concepts and how they projected themselves as the defenders of traditional American values, and the authentic representatives of the ‘average’ citizen who is supposedly being manipulated by the liberal elites. Instead of focusing the political discourse on the economic interests of the voters, on transparent and accountable governance, and the political empowerment of a well-informed citizenry, conservatives shifted the discourse to explosive or so-called cultural ‘wedge’ issues such as abortion, banning gay marriage, prayers in schools, opposition to gun control and immigration. In this surreal and myopic world, the alienated citizen undermines his/her own interests without realizing it. Thus, ‘Strip today’s Kansans of their job security, and they head out to become registered Republicans. Push them off their land, and next thing you know they are protesting in front of abortion clinics’.
Of demagogues, narcissists and flamethrowers
Every election cycle in recent decades brought with it an assortment of ambitious, self-appointed saviors of the Republic. Narcissists, eccentrics, publicity seekers, demagogues, rich men and women who believe that they are entitled to lead, who run along serious candidates with established political records. Although the Republican Party tends to produce most of these candidates, the Democratic Party has had its own smaller share, notably Al Sharpton, who had a checkered political past, including dabbling in race exploitation. Four years ago, the initial phase of the Republican Presidential race was dominated by Congresswoman Michele Bachmann, a loud flamethrower, and Herman Cain, an eccentric and unserious candidate.
This year, the large Republican field, with its well-known governors, like Scott Walker and Rick Perry, former governor Jeb Bush. and sitting senators like Lindsey Graham and Marco Rubio, has been shaken by Donald Trump, the loudest, meanest, most reckless, most uninformed and richest mouth that has entered the political Coliseum in recent years. And like the gladiators of yore, he shows no mercy while cutting his scorched-earth path. Donald Trump will not clinch the nomination of his party, but because of his wealth and celebrity and the shameless fascination of the Media (particularly television) with his incredibly inarticulate and vacant views, he will leave a trail of political wreckage in his wake that could conceivably undermine the Republican Candidacy.
Keeping the barbarians behind the wall
Trump declared his candidacy on June 16, with vintage unrestrained arrogance, claiming that he would be the greatest president ever elected, and vowing to deprive Iran of nuclear power and defeating the ‘Islamic State’ ISIS, without saying how. Then the mouth began to spew some of the most nativist, xenophobic and overtly racist insults against Mexican immigrants ever uttered publicly by a candidate.’ They're sending people that have lots of problems, and they're bringing those problems to us. They're bringing drugs. They're bringing crime. They're rapists.’ Trump was throwing red meat to the hard core nativist conservatives in the Republican Party, exploiting their fear of illegal immigration and promising them that he will build a wall, to keep the proverbial barbarians behind at bay. Trump found the convenient enemy, and his popularity soared, in part because the Media allowed itself to be exploited by a master manipulator. In a silent commentary on the lack of moral courage and basic decency, most of his rivals and the National Republican Committee refrained from criticizing his racist rants. There was no profile in courage anywhere in the Republican field.
When Trump viciously attacked Senator John McCain’s status as a war hero who languished and got tortured in Vietnamese jails for 5 years, because he was ‘captured’, his rivals realized that he provided them with an easy and uncostly reason to pounce on him. Governor Rick Perry was the candidate that stood out among his peers, when he delivered an eloquent speech warning that Trump’s political rampage could derail the Republican Party in the election. In a speech in Washington, Perry called Trump’s candidacy ‘a cancer on conservatism’ that ‘must be clearly diagnosed, excised and discarded’ if the Party is to be preserved. Perry said that ‘Trumpism..is a toxic mix of demagoguery, mean-spiritedness and nonsense that will lead the Republican Party to perdition if pursued’.
A reservoir of alienation and idiocy
But not even attacking a national hero could slow Trump’s numbers from rising in opinion polls. Analysts said that Trump was tapping into a deep reservoir of voters’ alienation from a dysfunctional political system, a lack of an effective immigration policy, that Republicans are not thrilled with the current field, and the voters’ fascination with blunt spoken candidates ‘who tell it like it is’ and can stand up to China, Russia, Iran and other adversaries of America. It is also true that Trump was tapping into an equally deep reservoir of voters’ ignorance, apathy and idiocy.
The Republican race looked like a circus, and some of the acts could have been very entertaining if the status of America in the world was not very serious, with unprecedented violence in the Middle East and an assertive, even belligerent, Russia and China. Other candidates had to come up with their own stunts, to show the voters that they are still in the race. Senator Graham released a video in which he was shown destroying his cell phone in a variety of funny ways, after Trump carelessly revealed his cell phone number publicly. Senator Rand Paul had his own act online in which he was shown burning or shredding the United States tax code. One wonders, who will save the party of Abraham Lincoln, Theodor Roosevelt, and Dwight Eisenhower from itself? Watching this political spectacle, a circus with multiple simultaneous acts, one can only ask: What is the matter with America?
The L'enfant terrible of Republican politics
In previous election cycles, some of the current candidates sought Trump’s political endorsement and financial help. Mitt Romney, the Republican nominee in 2012 said after receiving Trump’s blessings: ‘having his endorsement is a delight’, despite Trump’s racial and ethnic attacks on President Obama, and after questioning repeatedly whether the President was born in the United States. Many of those Republicans who were rightly indignant when Trump questioned Senator McCain’s heroism in the war, were leading the charge to destroy the reputation of Democratic Senator John Kerry, another Vietnam veteran who has his own share of scars and medals, when he ran against President George W. Bush in 2004.
Donald Trump, in his abrasive, aggressive and ruthless McCarthyism, is at home in the Republican Party circa 2015. This is a party that has been nursing in recent decades a culture of demonization of Democrats and liberalism (Democrats are not innocents of such demonization, but they have not been as thorough and as relentless as the radical conservatives in the Republican Party have been). The rallying cry of the Reagan Revolution that the Federal Government is the problem, has morphed into hostility against Government and that hostility towards Government and the paying of taxes constitute the main pillars of the new religion of the Republican Party.
In recent years, all the non-fundamental issues of governance (almost unfettered access to guns, abortion, same sex marriage, denial of climate change) have become the hallmark of the Republican Party. Some Republican leaders wallow in their denial of climate change and the theory of evolution and they relish the status of the Republican Party as the anti-science party. The Republican convention in 2012 adopted a number of planks that demonstrated the surreal world that author Thomas Frank described in his book: a plank against abortion, a plank against immigration, a plank against the ridiculous and non-existing threat of the so-called Sharia Law and a plank calling for stricter enforcement laws against adult pornography. The obsession of some conservative Republicans with some sex related issues, reminds me of the similar – actually worse- obsession with sex that many radical and Salafi Islamists exhibit.
Disquieting elections
The United States is still, and should remain, uniquely qualified to lead the world in these times of global transitions in regions as varied as the Middle East, Europe and East Asia, and in the areas of trade, communications and social media, and should remain capable of doing great things, preferably with partners, but alone if necessary. But the current paralysis and dysfunction in Washington will prevent even a gifted and strong President regardless of his or her party affiliation from pursuing such goals. More than sixty years ago, the world was envious of America’s marvelous inter-state highway system and bridges (Built by the Republican Eisenhower), a network that is decrepit and crumbling right now. The United States is the only advanced country in the world without a high speed trains. Income inequality is threatening the middle class, and most Americans don’t think that their best days are ahead. There are spaces of poverty in the country that are truly shameful. The presidential race is disquieting, and is dominated by uninspiring, average and mediocre candidates from both parties. We may end up with two candidates representing two entrenched political dynasties that have dominated presidential politics since the 1980’s. Surely America deserves better than this.
Two years ago, I lamented in this space that ‘the U.S. today, is a disheveled superpower. We are no longer the leaders in education, health, economic growth, personal income and happiness. Unless radical systemic reforms are enacted soon, the country will continue to muddle through a polarized, darker territory. This is no way to govern a ‘great power’. Is it too much to ask : What is the matter with America?

The Gulf’s disagreement with the U.S. is on details
Abdulrahman al-Rashed/Al Arabiya/Sunday, 26 July 2015
Some Saudis and Arabs received the West’s agreement with Iran over the latter’s nuclear program with joy or anger while others gloated about it or considered it an absolute victory for Iran and a final defeat of Gulf countries. Hold your horses! Yes, there’s a crisis and a real dispute here; however it’s over details and it will most probably not change much in regards to relations with Washington. We must take into consideration two major issues: the magnitude of Gulf interests in the U.S. and the diminutive Iranian capabilities which cannot replace four important Gulf countries – Saudi Arabia, the UAE., Qatar and Kuwait – when it comes to relations of interests. I will here discuss why Iran is not an alternative to Gulf countries, and I will do so according to the theory of zero-sum game where your rival’s gains of utility are balanced by your losses of utility. Iran produces 3 million barrels of oil per day while its four Gulf neighbors’ daily production is 15 million. Its productive capabilities are run-down due to the technical and economic embargo and it will need more than 10 years to reform and double their output! Oil experts estimate that in 2020, and after developing these capabilities, its production will only increase by a million barrels per day and hence become 4 million. These are real numbers in the calculations of international relations, and we must not become too busy reading news of businessmen’s trips to Iran to represent arms’ companies or oil, industry and banking corporates to seal valuable deals in anticipation of Iran’s promised openness to the world. To these businessmen, Iran is an additional market and not an alternative one. Doing business there will not be that easy due to the government’s centralization and the state institutions’ struggle over the country’s revenues. The Revolutionary Guards, for example, sought to control important production sectors, including petroleum refineries. The regime still views the agreement with suspicion especially when it comes to Gulf countries. Some in Tehran fear that the agreement is a Western conspiracy that aims to alter the regime from within. Iran’s government, like Gulf countries, mainly depends on oil sales as around 80% of its revenues come from oil and not from industry or agriculture!
Some pictured the $150 billion which Iran is said to attain as a result of the deal as a treasure trove that will alter the face of the country. First of all, these alleged $150 billion are not a reward but Iranian assets which were frozen due to sanctions. The West refused to unfreeze these assets until the Iranians accepted to negotiate on their nuclear program, and this is exactly what happened. Second of all, the amount is not that huge. Iran suffers from financial inability and poverty, and its infrastructure is corroded due to the long siege and will require much more than the sums retrieved, to reform it. Half of their civil aviation jets are no longer suitable for usage according to Iran Air’s manager who also said that they intend to buy 100 new aircrafts.
What we see around us is a massive Iranian propaganda that pictures retreat as a victory. No matter how much we criticize the deal, truth is the West actually made Iran submit. Gulf countries will not lose; they will rather win because the deal will curb the nuclear threat. If American President Barack Obama’s expectations are true that Iran will change due to the deal, then it will also serve the interests of Gulf countries, the region and the world if Tehran’s regime becomes a peaceful one. Gulf anger and controversy towards the U.S. is over details because the deal could have been stricter in regards to restraining Iran’s hostile policy.
Is retreat a victory?
What we see around us is a massive Iranian propaganda that pictures retreat as a victory. The Iranian government and its allies are dancing with joy in order to convince the Iranian people and those who support them that Iran won the 35-years battle against the West. However, so far this is untrue. The Iranian regime negotiated, froze its nuclear program, and signed the deal because it’s trying to escape the fate of countries similar to it. When Libya was subject to economic sanctions, the Qaddafi regime weakened and collapsed by the first spark of uprising against it. When economic sanctions were imposed on Syria, it weakened and the regime failed at dealing with the Arab Spring. Before that, Iraq suffered this fate during the reign of Saddam Hussein as Baghdad surrendered just one week after the invasion was launched against it. Let’s not forget the Soviet Union, which was exhausted by the economic siege, until it collapsed and disintegrated into 11 republics in 1991.
Although the American government rushed and could have attained better concessions, the agreement itself can be viewed as a 90-degrees turn by the Tehran regime who in the recent past totally refused to suspend, freeze or impose any conditions on its nuclear program and some in Iran even considered all of the latter as high treason. The Iranian regime spent billions of dollars on its nuclear program with hidden extra operation costs. Iran has also lost significant economic and financial opportunities due to the sanctions which were imposed on it. Two years ago. its economy deteriorated in terms of monetary standards to the extent where the dollar stands currently at 25,000 Iranian riyals.
The regime realized it will not live long due to the deterioration of its revenues and the siege against it so it brought the moderate Hassan Rowhani as president in order to begin its concessions with the West before it collapses, and it did so especially after having seen the fate of regimes similar to it, like the regimes of Saddam Hussein, Bashar al-Assad and Moammar Qaddafi. The only problem is that we don’t know if the Iranian regime is practicing some sort of false play that gives the impression it decided to change and catch up with the world. What’s certain is that it encouraged the American administration to seal a deal that saves the Iranian Government’s face before its citizens by stating that the deal did not cancel the nuclear program but just postponed it.
We think Washington could have waited to reach a better agreement that obstructs Iran’s aggressive policy and not just restrain its nuclear program. It’s clear that Tehran was willing to go far if pressure on it persisted. However, the White House was rushing to attain a deal which it thought will do the job and will be capable of changing Iran’s behavior later. What about the Gulf countries’ relations with the U.S.? Was their alliance with it a mistake from the very beginning? Watch this space tomorrow.

What Tomi Lahren got right and Obama got wrong
Faisal J. Abbas/Al Arabya
Sunday, 26 July 2015
Upon watching America News Network’s Tomi Lahren’s recent – and understandably angry - rant over what she described as her government’s “failed, half-way, half-baked, tip-toe, be friendly with Jihadis mentality,” one couldn’t help but think that the world might have been a better place today had someone – as firm and determined as her – been the U.S. president instead of President Obama. Indeed, had Mr. Obama been a bit more like Ms. Lahren, then he would have probably not backed away from the red-line which he himself imposed on the Syrian regime when he warned against using chemical weapons, but then ended up doing nothing. However, as a result of this ‘lack of strategy’, we went from having a few hundred ISIS fighters back then, to what experts estimate to be anything between tens of thousands to 200,000 members today with operations not just in the Middle East and North Africa, but in Europe and the U.S. as well.
Similarly, had the White House listened to the advice from its allies in the region which urged it not to back Iraqi PM Nouri al-Maliki, who deliberately marginalized and targeted Sunnis after the U.S. promised them their rights and a seat at the table if they cooperated with Baghdad to defeat al-Qaeda (which they did in 2008 through the ‘Sahwat’ or ‘awakening’ movement), then maybe Iraq would have been a different place today and ‘yesterday’s moderate’ wouldn’t have become today’s terrorist,’ as Lahren said.
As a result of this ‘lack of strategy’, we went from having a few hundred ISIS fighters back then, to thousands of members today. Even when it was clear that the ISIS crisis was brewing, the Obama administration still didn’t act quickly enough – perhaps because it thought that this wasn’t an American problem, or that maybe this would be a great opportunity to lure in extremist Sunnis and extremist Shiites to fight and eradicate each other.
However, as a result of this ‘lack of strategy’, we went from having a few hundred ISIS fighters back then, to thousands of members today, with operations not just in the Middle East and North Africa, but in Europe and the U.S. as well.
What happened to ‘we don’t negotiate with terrorists?’Now, while the U.S. government’s ‘lack of strategy’ has helped Sunni extremism flourish (against the interests of key American allies such as Saudi Arabia, which are - on an official level –major allies in the war against terrorism), the Obama administration went against the long-standing American principal of ‘not negotiating with terrorists’ when it signed the nuclear deal with Iran, who has been regarded as one of the biggest state sponsors of terrorism.
Of course, President Obama may fancy himself a peacemaker by approaching Iran with open arms and convincing them to get rid of their nuclear weapons ambitions. But what is he going to do about their non-nuclear acts of terrorism? Or has he forgotten the 444 day hostage crisis when 52 American diplomats and citizens were held by supporters of the Islamic Revolution of 1979? Iran is also responsible for the 1983 Beirut barrack bombings, which targeted U.S. marines and thanks to the nuclear deal it signed with the U.S., will now be able to better finance Hezbollah, who were behind the attack. Hezbollah, despite once being hailed by many Arabs and Muslims as liberators, has been a destabilizing force ever since the Israeli withdrawal from Lebanon in 2000 and is regarded today by the U.S. and some of its Arab allies a terrorist group.
Did President Obama not hear the news that just yesterday, Hezbollah Secretary-General Hassan Nasrallah said America will still remain the “Great Satan” and that the Lebanese party can still count on Iran’s support even after the nuclear deal? Of course, this echoes the sentiments of Nasrallah’s leader: Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei who – immediately after his country signed the deal with the U.S. - said that Iran won't stop backing its allies, labelling America as “arrogant.” This was followed by his latest tweet showing a silhouette of a man, believed to be U.S. President Barack Obama, holding a gun to his head with a caption reading: “We welcome no war nor do we initiate war but if any war happens, the one who will emerge loser will be the aggressive and criminal U.S.”
A cartoon being shared widely on social media depicts Barack Obama saying "Dear Axis of Evil!" and Rowhani responding with "Dear Great Satan!"Furthermore, Iran – through the many other terrorists groups it funds and directs - has played a major role in destabilizing Iraq and undermining all efforts to bring peace, co-existence and unity to the country following the 2003 war. Aided by their ally, former PM Nouri al-Maliki, Iranian paramilitary groups such as Asaib Ahl Al-Haq (AAH), have been involved in around 6000 attacks on American, coalition and Iraqi forces. The group is linked with the killing and kidnapping of American soldiers and British civilians. Of course, not only is Iran responsible for sponsoring Shiite terrorist groups, but Sunni ones too. In fact, according to the U.S.’s own State Department, Tehran was home to a number of Al-Qaeda facilitators and high ranking financiers. These accusations are also backed by findings of the U.S. Treasury Department as well.
Many Gulf countries, which are all major U.S. allies, also accuse Iran of meddling with their internal affairs and encouraging their Shiite citizens to revolt against their governments.Most recently, tensions between Saudi Arabia and Iran reached their peak as Riyadh accused the Islamic Republic of backing the Houthi militias in Yemen. The Houthis – who chant “DEATH TO AMERICA” as part of their daily discourse, have reportedly been receiving aid and backing from Iran (yes, the same country President Obama just lifted sanctions and financial restrictions on)
Last March, Saudi Arabia formed a coalition and waged an ongoing military campaign against the Houthis and in support of the legitimate government of President Abdrabbu Mansour Hadi who is now living in exile.
The Houthis – who chant “DEATH TO AMERICA” as part of their daily discourse, have reportedly been receiving aid and backing from Iran (yes, the same country President Obama just lifted sanctions and financial restrictions on).
To conclude, although she did get several things right; one could easily also disagree with many of Tomi Lahren’s views as well; mostly based on the fact that she thinks extremism is becoming the norm, this is unfair to the majority of good, moderate and hardworking American Muslims (including those in the armed forces). However, it is okay for her to err. After all, unlike the case is with Obama, she is not the President of the United States and people’s lives are not at stake!

News Bulletin Achieves Since 2006 Click Here to go to the LCCC Daily English/Arabic News Buletins Archieves Since 2006

News Bulletin Achieves Since 2006
Click Here to go to the LCCC Daily English/Arabic News Buletins Archieves Since 2006